Beauty and the Geek- B/J AU part 2/6

[guavejuice]

Banner by Vonnie yvonnereid Thank you SO much!!!
Special thanks to kinwad

Author:guavejuice
Pairing:Brian/Justin
Brian's POV
Beta:Kim predec2 Can't thank you enough!!
This isn't a WIP.
Click here for previous chapters.
Disclaimer:I own nothing
Comments are love.

Part 2

"What is it, Brian?" my friend, Lindsay, asks me in surprise as she glances up from her desk and sees me unexpectedly enter her office; she’s not only one of my closest friends, but the head of my Art Department, also. "What are you doing here? I thought you had that important presentation this morning?” She creases her brow in concern. “Is there something wrong? Did something happen, and we didn’t get the account after all?” She rambles on and on; I stand there, pinching the bridge of my nose and take a deep breath, feeling a twinge of a headache beginning to stir.

"I didn't even make it to the fucking meeting," I manage to admit after a long pause.

"Let me guess,” she responds dryly. “Was it because you were too busy attending a different kind of fucking meeting?" She presses her lips together and stares at me.

"Not quite…" I reply a little defensively; when it comes to my company, I am quite responsible, no matter how hot a trick might have been the night before.

"Excuse me?" she responds with one arched eyebrow. "Come on… I know you, Brian," she reminds me.

I sigh in exasperation. "No, Lindz, it's not what you think. It's…fuck! It's so fucking stupid," I add, pulling my lips inward and covering my face with the palms of my hands.

"I don't have time for this, Brian," Lindsay tells me primly. It’s obvious she still doesn’t believe me. "Neither one of us does. I have an art department to run…And a VERY demanding boss who should be attending a meeting right now to lure in yet another potential client," she adds, crossing her arms over her chest, drawing pencil wedged between her fingers.

"It’s not…" I begin to explain, but I really can’t continue; even I don’t understand it.

“Don't tell me you're experiencing performance anxiety, Brian," she replies with a smirk as I glare over at her in shock.

“I have NEVER had ‘performance anxiety’ in my life,” I retort.

“I didn’t mean THAT kind of performance anxiety,” Lindsay replies with a laugh as she scoots back from her desk and rises to her feet to approach me. “Well, whatever’s going on, you need to get your ass up there and close that deal!" she urges me with a smile, patting me on the shoulder encouragingly before returning to her desk to take a seat.

Lindsay is the only one I would ever let talk to me in such a brazen manner. I let out a deep breath before insisting, "I… I can't.”

"Care to explain why?" she asks, now extremely curious about my hesitation.

"Well there's this guy…" I begin tentatively.

A wide grin spreads across my friend's face as she snickers back at me. "There's ALWAYS a guy, Brian. Will you ever learn?" she shakes her head with a knowing smile as if she's talking to Gus, her fourteen-year-old son. I mean, OUR son, since I’m Gus’s biological dad, but she's raising him with her partner, Mel.

I admit I have a soft spot for Lindsay – not romantically or anything, of course – but she's one of the few people I wouldn’t snap at while we discuss ‘guys’. But this time it's a whole different situation. Fuck, I can't believe I allowed myself to get into such a ludicrous predicament. What was the big deal, anyway? I didn’t owe that guy anything. But it would make me look like some sort of idiot, and Brian Kinney was never an idiot.

"Let's just say I have to hide out in here for a while," I finally tell her, realizing how ridiculous that sounded.

"Wait… you totally lost me now,” she replies with a frown. “Why do you have to hide in here? Is there an angry trick somewhere chasing you?" she presses me before she teases me with a smile, “Or did you find another one that wouldn’t take no for an answer when he asked for a repeat?”

"Hell, no!" I retort. I shake my head slightly while I try to compose a logical explanation. "It's this guy…he…FUCK!” I close my eyes briefly, pressing my hand to my forehead before I explain, “This guy was searching for me because I'm apparently supposed to meet him in person for a job interview. He's an IT guy, and he looks like one, too. He’s dressed like some middle aged salesman, except he’s lugging around a laptop and a duffel bag instead of a vacuum cleaner.” She looks at me in bewilderment as I continue. “Anyway, when he approached me in the lobby earlier, I stupidly thought it might be fun to play dumb for a while and do some role playing, so when he asked me if I knew where ‘Mr. Kinney’ was, I told him that…” I stop to take a breather.

"…That you didn’t have a clue," Lindsay finishes my sentence with a smirk, grinning back at me in that annoyingly cool and collected way of hers that always makes me irritated; sort of a ‘mother knows best’ look.

I glare back at her as I explain, "So when he got into the elevator with me and pressed the button to my floor, I had to improvise. So I pressed the button for the Art Department, instead, and here I am.”

"How very clever," Lindsay comments with a wry chuckle. "And VERY mature of you."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence; I really needed that," I tell her sarcastically. "Fuck! I don't even know why I bother." I pull my phone out and press the speed dial. When Cynthia answers I already know by the clipped tone of her voice that she's not pleased and that there are a million and one things waiting for me upstairs in my office, including an angry client who's waiting for his meeting with me. AND an IT candidate that I was supposed to interview…as if I didn’t already know that.

It figures that an IT person would know his way around the building. The persistent, little shit obviously found my office without any trouble. Only he doesn't know it's MY office. Fuck.

I tuck my tongue inside my cheek, trying to avoid Lindsay’s meaningful gaze as I tell Cynthia to ask Ted to fill in for me at the presentation while she takes charge of the job interview with the IT guy. She tries to protest at first, but then I reply with one of my classic one-liners, and she knows then that she has no choice but to comply as I flip the phone shut and let out a weary sigh, brushing my hand through my hair.

"Ahh…the old ‘something came up’ line,” Lindsay murmurs in amusement; I realize she overheard everything I had said. I shrug back at her in response. Fuck, she does know me so well. Good thing that I love dick and she's into pussy, or else we could be the ideal example of a perfect, straight marriage. Wait… did I just mention MARRIAGE??? Fuck, NO! I shake my head, trying to get rid of that mental image. With the sudden glut of same-sex marriages, it seems like I'm the only one that's standing alone against the matrimonial tidal wave. Fuck, I'm all for equality and shit, but I can't even see myself being tied down eating the same ass – not to mention the same dick – for all eternity.

"Brian?" Lindsay interrupts my musing as she tries to bring me back to reality.

"Umm… yeah, something like that," I answer her absently. Damn it. I really can't afford to miss that meeting. It's not that I NEED another account, because Kinnetik is doing really well with all the latest gay friendly ad campaigns that are emerging now, but I need to be there. It's my job. I can't let that shaggy-haired, geeky guy I met briefly in the lobby cloud my judgment or prevent me from doing what I need to do.

TBC…