Work Text:
The small printer comes to life with the familiar mechanical whirring as it spits out another ticket. Zayn finishes polishing the glass in his hand before checking the new mobile order.
The dinner rush has ended and he’s been tidying up in the back as the last few orders of the night trickle in.
He reads over the ticket.
Order for: Louis T. (Deliveroo)
Order placed: 8:03 pm
1 Fish Burrito
Special Instructions: No olives please (who tf puts olives on burritos anyway?!)
Zayn rolls his eyes and chuckles to himself. When he designed this burrito a month ago, he was excited to pair the tangy saltiness of sliced black olives with the richness of the fried fish. He had no clue black olives would be so polarizing. Half of the people that order the new menu item request the olives be left out. It’s a shame that they will be missing one of the main accent flavors, but he understands not everyone is as willing to eat everything like his best friend and business partner, Niall.
Niall and Zayn had started up their own restaurant a few years ago. Zayn develops the menu and manages the restaurant, while Niall is his trusty taste-tester and bookkeeper.
Zayn gets to work, placing two battered fillets of whitefish into the oil with a satisfying sizzle of hot oil. He gets to work adding the other layers of burrito filling, beans, rice, cheese, a special spicy aioli sauce. The fryer timer buzzes. He takes the fish out, seasons them, and adds them to the burrito. With a practiced fold, he quickly wraps it all in the warm tortilla and places it in the compostable take out box.
As he places the take out ticket on top of the box, the special instructions catch his eye once more. There’s just something about the way that it’s phrased that makes Zayn want to respond to this customer, who clearly doesn’t know what amazing flavor combo he’s missing out on.
Zayn grabs the black marker out of his apron pocket. He begins to doodle. A few minutes later as he’s putting the finishing touches on the scene the door opens.
“Hey, Z.” Harry, a regular Deliveroo rider, comes in. He’s dressed in his standard teal windbreaker paired with matching highlighter yellow trainers and bike helmet. His long curls stick out wildly under the fluorescent helmet.
“Hey, Harry. Sorry, I got side-tracked. Let me bag up this order for you.” Zayn caps his marker.
“What do you have here?” Harry leans over the counter and checks out Zayn’s drawing. “That’s amazing! I didn’t know you could draw!”
“Oh, yeah. Thanks,” Zayn shrugs off the compliment. Overall, the doodle had turned out well. There’s an angry sandwich character next to a sign that reads No olives! On the right, two very sad olives sulk away.
He places the box in the takeout bag and hands it over to Harry. “Have a good night, H.”
He didn’t mean for the drawings to become a thing. But they have. Every Tuesday night around eight o’clock, a take out order from Louis T. appears. Each order has new special instructions, requesting some change to the carefully curated dishes that Zayn has concocted. And every Tuesday night, Zayn doodles a response to those special instructions.
The restaurant is usually slow enough this late on a Tuesday night, and the sketches have become a welcome break from the stress of running his restaurant. Some are more detailed than others. Broccoli playing an electric guitar, nerdy slices of tomatoes, and a depressed block of tofu. Last week was his most elaborate scene yet. When the special instructions requested his pot roast with mashed potatoes and gravy be served without his perfectly sautéed mushrooms, Zayn had drawn out a mushroom walking the plank of a potato’s pirate ship into a sea of gravy.
As expected the ticket comes in just after eight.
Order for: Louis T. (Deliveroo)
Order placed: 8:07 pm
1 Poutine
1 extra gravy
Special Instructions: give me lots of that delicious gravy please!
Zayn laughs loudly. Finally, Louis T. is appreciating the work Zayn has put into his dishes. Zayn gets the fries and cheese curds into the hot oil and excitedly reaches for his marker. He sketches a cat dripping from head to tail in gravy, with cat tongue sticking out as if to lick the gravy up.
The fryer timer buzzes and he gets back to work plating up the dish. Harry comes in as he’s drizzling the extra gravy over the dish. “Hey Zayn. What’ve we got tonight?”
Zayn turns the container around to show off his work. Harry has been a fan of these new drawings each week, and Zayn has fun showing them off.
Harry tilts his head and asks, “Is it a pun? Let me guess. Drowning cat? Soaked kitty?” Harry gasps covering his mouth scandalously and stage-whispers, “Is it a wet pussy?”
Zayn covers his heated face and laughs. “No stop! It’s gravy. The cat is covered in gravy.” Zayn grabs the marker and quickly adds “delicious gravy soaked cat” alongside his drawing for some much needed clarification.
“Damn. I thought you’d finally decided to make a move, albeit a weird one. Watching you flirt through these take out orders is killing me.”
“I’m not flirting!” Zayn says, taken aback by the suggestion.
“Then why don’t any of the other take out orders I deliver have cute drawings?” Harry puts his hands on his hips and levels Zayn with a knowing look.
“I’m too busy during the day. And besides I don’t even know who this Louis T. is. Could be anyone.”
“I can tell you he’s a graduate student, and he’s very good looking. Plus, he laughs at all of your drawings. I could get his number for you, if you want.”
“No, no. That’s alright. I swear it’s not flirting. It’s just a quick doodle every once in a while.”
“Alright, if you say so.” Harry doesn’t believe him at all. He takes the delivery bag, salutes Zayn, and is out the door before Zayn can argue any more.
Zayn leans on the counter, sketching out another scene for his favorite customer.
Zayn had started this doodle as soon as the panini hit the press. With a panini in the press, he has a bit of extra time to draw a more detailed picture.
The special instructions tonight were clear: Hold the avocado those do piss me off. Zayn had laughed out loud at the frankness of the instructions. Louis T. sure was a picky eater, yet he kept coming back for more of Zayn’s cooking every Tuesday.
This time he draws an army of rogue avocados. Zayn gives the commanding avocado at the front a sword to raise with its little stick arm. Behind him are dozens of smaller battle-ready avocados with their own weapons.
Harry comes in “Heya, Z. What’s tonight’s special request?”
Niall chooses that moment to come out of the back office. It’s month-end so he’s been working late to do his spreadsheets. “Special request?”
“Have you seen Zayn’s drawings? They're amazing!”
Niall turns to Zayn, raising an eyebrow. “No, I haven’t.”
Zayn shrugs and points to the avocado army. “I’ve just doodled on some take out containers when I get a special instruction. Only if there’s time before the pickup happens.”
“And only for one customer, too. I think he has a crush.” Harry teases unhelpfully.
“It’s not a crush,” Zayn protests.
Niall just shakes his head and laughs.
Zayn finishes ringing up the last customer as Liam starts to prepare their orders. A month ago he would have been stuck closing up shop alone. Their sales have exploded almost overnight after one glowing review from a local food critic. The Now Hiring sign had only been in the window for two days when Liam, one of Zayn’s classmates from culinary school, had dropped by and taken the job. Zayn couldn’t be more thankful for his friend’s extra help now that business had picked up.
Zayn unties his apron as he heads into the back to change. A few minutes later, he has changed into tight black jeans and a grey jumper, much more appropriate for a first date than his work clothes.
“I’m heading out,” Zayn says, waving to Liam.
“Good luck. Have fun on your date,” Liam calls out.
“Wait!” Niall rushes out of his office. “You have a date?”
Zayn groans. He’d forgotten Niall was still in the office, or he would have snuck out the back quietly.
Liam explains, “Yeah, I set him up with my mate, Tommo. I think they’d be great together.”
“Ooh a blind date! Tell me more.” Niall has never been one to turn down an opportunity to meddle in his friends’ love lives. Liam pulls out his phone, surely opening Instagram to show Niall the photos he’d used to convince Zayn to go out with Tommo.
“I’d love to but I really have to go now.” Zayn says pointing at the nonexistent watch on his wrist. “Wish me luck.” Leaving his two friends to gossip about him, he heads out for his date.
The date had gotten off to a shaky start. Zayn arrived right on time and found his date already seated, recognizing him from the Instagram photos Liam had shown him. But confusion set in when the man introduced himself as Louis. Zayn couldn’t believe his friend would secretly set him up with someone named Louis just to make fun of him. Liam, Niall, and Harry had all been relentless in their teasing about his drawings. In spite of his friends’ plans to embarrass him, he set aside his confusion and tried to have a good time. After all, it wasn’t Louis’ fault Zayn’s friends could be arseholes.
As they talked, Zayn had felt a spark instantly. As the night progressed, that spark grew into a hot ember. They barely made it back to Louis’ place before that fire grew too hot. It bursts into a raging flame as Louis presses Zayn up against a door.
Zayn moans into their kiss, his hands roaming the lithe body pressed against his. Breathless, Zayn pulls back and asks, “Bedroom?”
Louis steps back, his pupils blown out, and lips already bruised. He leads Zayn down the hall and turns on the light. Zayn pulls his jumper over his head and tosses it to the floor. He follows Louis to the bed. Something on the nightstand catches his eye.
It’s a drawing. His drawing.
He’d recognize that gravy-covered cat anywhere.
“Zayn, you joining me?” Louis asks from the middle of the bed, voice rough with desire.
“Where did you get these?”
“A restaurant. They’re cool, aren’t they?”
Zayn picks up the stack of container covers. There’s nearly a dozen. He recalls each of the special instructions that inspired them. Zayn turns back to Louis. “Did Liam set you up to this?”
“What do you mean? He set up the date.”
“These are my drawings.” Zayn shakes the handful of take out covers.
Louis gasps, “Really? I didn’t know.”
“Everyone at the restaurant has been trying to convince me to talk to the customer for weeks. They all thought I was flirting. But I wasn’t, it was just some fun little drawings.”
“They are fun little drawings. You know, I order every Tuesday night. I have a lecture that ends pretty late on Tuesday nights, and then I study at the library for a few more hours. I’d started the semester ordering from a new restaurant every week to try new things. But then one week, I’d just finished a really difficult test in that lecture. I was sure I’d failed. I was so stressed, but then the food I ordered showed up, and it had a funny little drawing of some sad olives. It totally turned my night around. So I kept ordering from the same place. Every week I had some new drawings to look forward to.”
Zayn laughs, “I was just frustrated that everyone hated the idea of olives on a burrito.”
“Olives don’t belong on burritos! But I’ll forgive you, since most of what you cook tastes alright.”
“Just alright?”
Louis dodges the question. “So, do you give drawings to all your customers?”
“No, of course not.”
“You were flirting with me!” Louis laughs and pulls Zayn onto the bed. The handful of drawings scatter to the floor.
The restaurant has been busier than ever, usually with customers lined up at the counter until Niall flips the Closed sign. It’s another Tuesday night, and the orders keep coming in. Zayn can’t remember the last time he had a slow shift, and misses those nights when he could find a few extra minutes to create a drawing for his favorite customer.
Louis passed all his classes last semester, and his new schedule is thankfully void of late-night lectures, so he hasn’t been placing his regular orders anyway. Now, when he wants Zayn’s cooking he comes to the restaurant himself.
Zayn is chopping up onions when Liam comes in with a ticket in hand. “Order for you, Chef.”
“Can you take it please? We’ve run out of a dozen things back here and I am struggling to keep up.”
“I think you’ll want to see the note on this one.” Liam holds it out for Zayn to read.
Order for: Louis T. (Deliveroo)
Order placed: 5:54 pm
1 Fiesta Chicken Sandwich
Special Instructions: No cilantro! P.S. I love you even though you think nasty cilantro is an acceptable seasoning