A/N: This is not going to be a ReidxTyler. I know, I know. "Where's ReidxTyler?" The answer is.... DEAD!! JK. I just need to stretch my legs (so to speak) and work with some different pairings and stuff. I promise I'll be back to ReidxTyler soon. Maybe in another chapter or so, kay? Also!! I have a little project in the works, "Into the Dark". It's gonna be a group of Torchwood oneshots, all set to "Into the Dark" by Deathcab for Cutie if you're interested. :D
forgetMEalways: I love Halo. I had to include it. Blowing up n00bz has become part of my stress relief regimen, lol.
CoverGirlxx: I'm not a hardcore gamer either, but I do enjoy playing a few rounds of Live after work. I try to avoid talking though because apparently girls aren't allowed to play Halo and I sound about three years old over the mic. -_-' It's a little embarrassing, lol.
blo0d StaiNed Rose: Everyone has to get picked on sometime. Pogue is no exception to the rule, lol
raven2547: I could never really get into Kirby. o.0 I always preferred Zelda. XD
Dark Angel's Blue Fire: Glad you liked it, dear.
julliette: I was trying to make the story as entertaining as it actually was for me to play that level with an Irish kid and two kids from the northern east coast of the US. XD
OEMMA BLACKO: Yes, it was Silent Hill. The first time I watched that movie, it was midnight, my parents were having a night out and my brother was at a friend's house so I was home alone... I got to the Gray Children and decided it was time to watch Monty Python. XD
beginningxofxthexend: Well...I'm glad you liked it. And I do enjoy the "hang out" setting. I personally think that if Caleb is going to be slashed, it should be Chase he's slashed with. They balance eachother so nicely. :D And the "moaning into the mic" thing... It can be pretty damn awkward, especially if you happen to know all the people in your party chat personally. -_-' lol
Tyler chewed nervously on his lower lip. He'd been working in an office building for six weeks now, and he had a bit of a problem with his work place. There was another brunette that worked in his building, a very, very attractive brunette. Sure his eyes were serious, but that was the mystery. Was he that serious all the time? Did he ever lighten up? Tyler had a feeling he did, and he was damn good at reading people.
"You're not taking lunch?"
Tyler's head snapped up from the legal pad he was doodling on. His throat closed and he was sure he was going to die if he couldn't make his lungs work again.
"I'm...I'm waiting for Ryan to get back so I can go." Tyler finally managed to tell his office crush.
"Where do you usually go?"
"The coffee shop down the street. Why?"
"I'm headed that way myself. I'll wait."
"Wait for what?" Tyler felt like his thought process was covered in molasses. Frozen molasses.
"For Ryan to come back. Unless you don't want to ride with me. You know, save gas, save the environment."
Tyler was positive, at that moment, that he was in love. He had fallen for the pout. It wasn't obvious, Chase was too proud to be caught pouting for the world to see. But letting Tyler see was enough.
"I'd love to ride over there with you." Tyler smiled shyly.
Ryan waltzed up to the front desk to cover the phones while Tyler was at lunch. The red-head was complaining very loudly about some rude old woman in the parking lot and a guy on the road talking on his cell phone.
"Raz." Tyler tried.
"And then he had the nerve to sit through half a red light!" Ryan continued.
"Raz." Tyler got a little louder.
"I just don't understand some people. If the call is so important you can't drive, then pull into a parking lot and--"
"Ryan!" Tyler said loudly.
"What?" Ryan demanded.
"I'm taking lunch. Be back later." Tyler winked almost imperceptibly at his co-worker and Ryan got the idea.
"Yeah yeah. Just remember, all the time you're gone is time I get credit for and you don't." Ryan winked back.
Tyler rolled his eyes and followed Chase out of the building. Chase's BMW was a dark shade of blue and it gleamed in the sunlight. Chase held open the passenger-side door for Tyler and Tyler climbed in with a blush tinting his cheeks. Chase started the car and the radio started playing some old song by Radiohead. Tyler stared out the window and waited for Chase to start a conversation. Which he never did. They didn't talk as they bought lunch and they didn't talk when they sat down just outside the coffee shop.
"You ever feel like you're running in circles?" Chase finally asked.
Tyler looked up from his sandwich and sent Chase a questioning look.
"I wake up at 6:30, Monday through Friday and then at nine on Saturday and Sunday without the help of an alarm clock. I get to work at the same time every day, make it home about the same time every night... I do the same work throughout the week and the same chores on the weekend." (1) Chase admitted.
"It's monotonous." Tyler agreed.
"You ever get the urge to take a risk and maybe make a mistake just to keep things interesting?" Chase asked, his blue eyes locked onto Tyler's.
"I...I suppose." Tyler admitted.
"Hm." Chase zoned back out and went back to absent-mindedly nibbling at his sandwich.
"What do you usually do on Friday nights?" Chase asked.
"Whatch TV and play XBox. What about you?"
"Watch TV and eat enough Ben and Jerry's ice cream to put me in danger of going into a diabetic coma." Chase laughed.
"Yeah right. Have you seen your body? There's no way that's tr--" Tyler realized what he said and flushed bright red.
"I swear it's true." Chase smiled.
"I won't believe it until I see it." Tyler insisted.
"It's a date then."
"What?" Tyler choked on his soda.
"I'll prove to you that I'm a closet fat-ass." Chase grinned.
"You want me to go to your place on Friday night?" Tyler asked, still trying to process all that was going on.
"Sure. Keep things interesting. I'll buy the ice cream, you bring the beer and we'll play XBox and be half-drunk fat-asses for the night."
Tyler thought about it for a few long minutes. Reid probably would be pissed that there wouldn't be anyone at the flat for him to flaunt his latest sexcapade to, but that was the last thing Tyler wanted to deal with.
"I'll need your address and a time to be there." Tyler said with a smile.
Chase pulled a business card out of the pocket of his suit and a fountain pen too. He flipped the card over and quickly scribbled his address on the back before fanning the card to make the ink dry faster. He handed the card to Tyler who quickly put it in his pocket. Tyler glanced down at his watch and cursed softly. Chase glanced at his own watch and whistled lowly. Their half-hour for lunch was spent.
They discussed ice cream flavors, beer brands and XBox games on the drive back to the monolith of an office building. Chase left Tyler at the desk and headed towards the elevator.
"Tell me everything." Ryan grinned.
"Come on, Raz. What makes you think anything happened?" Tyler asked with a sigh.
"Because. You were smiling when you walked in." Ryan pointed out.
"I'm going to his place on Friday night so we can play XBox and be half-drunk fat-asses." Tyler smiled.
"That makes no sense to me, but judging by that shit-eating grin you have, I'll bet it means something to you." Ryan sighed.
"Yeah it does." Tyler grinned.
When Tyler got home that night, he glared at his calendar as it reminded him that it was only Wednesday. He pulled the card out of his pocket and flipped it over. He stopped short when he looked at the address on the back. There were two little hearts near the address and underneath was Chase's cell phone number. He chewed on his lower lip and wondered what it meant. He shrugged it off and pushed a thumbtack through the card and then through the wall next to his calendar.
Thursday was one of the longest and most horrific days for Tyler. He didn't see Chase at all that day and wondered if he was being set up. He drove home, a feeling of defeat blossoming through his chest. He climbed the stairs up to his apartment and glared at the business card stuck to his bedroom wall. His fingers traced across the letters and numbers on the back of the card. His defeat started churning and warming and became anger. He ripped the card off the wall and flung it across the room. His calendar and several books soon followed. When he finally calmed down, he looked around his normally neat room and flopped on the bed. He surveyed the damage again and stared at the little white card at his feet for quite some time before he finally decided to get up and put everything back in order.
"If he doesn't say something to me tomorrow, I'm going to call him and tell him that something came up. I'll tell him Reid is drunk in a gutter and needs my help or something." Tyler promised himself as he tacked the card back up.
Tyler was in to work thirty minutes early Friday morning. He sat down and sipped at his coffee, wary eyes glued to the door. He couldn't completely stop the smile that pulled at his lips when he saw Chase come sauntering through the doors, his tie a little loose, his hair a slight disaster, and his eyes miles away.
"Tyler! Is that meeting tonight still on?" Chase asked with a wink and what Tyler thought might have been desperation.
"Sure." Tyler smiled.
"I'll see you tonight then. Around eight. I have some errands to run."
"Okay." Tyler's smile was a little more shy this time.
Chase's fingers brushed across the back of Tyler's hand as he walked away and Tyler pushed down the urge to giggle like a giddy school girl.
"Well that was a cute exchange." Ryan smirked.
"Piss off, Raz." Tyler grinned.
"So there is something going on."
"What do you mean?" Tyler tried playing innocent.
"You know Jenna? The slut from payroll?"
"What about her?"
"Well, she's been trying to bed Mr. Collins there for a while until recently, he's just been very politely declined her offers to roll in the hay. Yesterday he flat out told her to piss off because he wasn't interested and would never be interested." Ryan smiled.
Tyler couldn't help but smile at that. He started to feel a bit giddy and had to mentally berrate himself to keep from giggling.
The clock moved its slowest that day. Tyler stared at the slow-moving hands, itching to be at Chase's flat, dying to be out of the office. He sighed almost imperceptibly when the clock inched ever closer to his acceptable punch-out time.
"Antsy?" Ryan asked with a smirk.
"Piss. Off." Tyler growled.
Tyler jumped when a hand was laid on his shoulder.
"I'll see you later." Chase smiled as he walked towards the doors.
"Yeah." Tyler smiled dazedly.
Tyler watched Chase walk away and then shook himself mentally to clear the dirty images clouding his mind. He watched the clock idly and waited for the numbers to change again.
"You wanna just go ahead and leave and I'll punch out for you?" Ryan asked with an amused smile.
"No. That will just make things worse. Because then instead of having the prospect of work to distract me, there will be nothing to distract me at home and I'll probably spontaneously combust." Tyler said slowly, an obvious attempt at calming himself down.
Ryan laughed at his friend and shook his head.
When he finally did punch out, Tyler forced himself to walk at a reasonable pace to his car and obey the speed limit until he got home and then he sat down on the couch and put it on a Doctor Who marathon and tried to lose himself in the story to make time pass a little quicker. Unfortunately, every few minutes, he was looking at the clock and wanting time to speed up.
When seven rolled around, Tyler climbed into the shower and made sure his movements were slow. He knew that if he gave himself half a chance he would undoubtedly rush through everything and he'd then be stuck sitting on the couch waiting for the clock to change again. It was 7:15 when he climbed out of the shower and got dressed. He fought with himself for a little bit before deciding to go ahead and wear his favorite casual outfit: Distressed jeans and a t-shirt advertising Star Wars: Return of the Jedi in Japanese. Sure the shirt clung to him, but he liked the way it looked. He eventually decided to stop stressing out about how he looked and he grabbed his keys, Chase's card, and the MapQuest directions next to the card. Tyler thought about it for a few minutes before grabbing Reid's six-pack from the fridge and replacing it with a yellow sticky note reading simply: "I O U". The blond would be pissed, but Tyler needed it. He, of course, stopped at a convenience store along the way and picked up two more.
He gathered up all of his courage, and the beer of course, and climbed the stairs to Chase's second-floor apartment. He nervously rang the doorbell. It was exactly 8 pm. Chase opened the door immediately.
"I knew you liked to be punctual, but this is very exact." Chase smiled as he took some of the beer from Tyler.
"I could always leave and come back in five minutes." Tyler grinned as he followed Chase inside.
"Why make me wait?" Chase asked.
Something about that statement struck Tyler as odd, but he decided he wasn't going to comment on it.
True to his word, Chase had several various flavors of Ben and Jerry's ice cream and a very large TV with game stations in front of it.
"I figured it would be a bad idea to play Halo or something similar until we're buzzed enough to giggle about getting achievements, so how about we start off with the original PlayStation and play a little Tekken?" Chase grinned.
"I will kick your ass, good sir." Tyler grinned.
They put the six pack down on the coffee table, and started to drink while the game loaded.
"King? What kind of noob chooses King?" Chase sneered playfully as he selected Jin.
"You wait. Ima kick your ass." Tyler smiled.
The two of them mashed buttons, executed larger-than-life combos, and made their virtual fighters battle to the death. Or at least Jin's death. Tyler spiked his controller onto the plush carpet and stood up, arms in the air like a receiver that had just scored the winning touchdown of the SuperBowl.
"All me. All me. You're dead." Tyler laughed.
"You always this happy about winning or is the alcohol getting to you already?" Chase smirked.
"Please. I could drink you under the table and still kick your ass at Tekken. I am the Tekken master." Tyler grinned.
Chase could tell by the look in Tyler's eyes that he was enjoying himself and not even buzzed.
"Yeah, yeah." Chase smiled.
They played a few more rounds of Tekken, drank their way through two of the three six-packs Tyler brought, and then paused to see who could eat a quart of Chunky Monkey ice cream faster. Chase won that one.
"Who's the master now?" Chase beamed.
"Piss your pants and pull 'em over your head." (1) Tyler smiled.
Chase very maturely responded by sticking out his tongue. When they finished the third six pack, they decided to up the ante by switching to Tekken Tag. Chase won a few rounds, but Tyler proved to be much better. By this point they had finished two six packs Chase already had on hand and were very well on the road to being completely sloshed.
"Okay. Strip Tekken." Chase growled.
"What?"
"Everytime you lose a round, you lose a piece of clothing." Chase grinned, his words beginning to slur.
"Fine."
Chase changed the game to Tekken 5 and grinned to himself. Tekken was one of those games he played better drunk. Tyler lost the first round and muttered to himself as he removed a sock.
"Both." Chase smiled.
"Huh?"
"Socks come in pairs. You're not worming out of two rounds so easy."
Tyler rolled his eyes and removed both socks. When he lost the next round, Tyler threw his shirt over the back of the couch. Round three, and Tyler's jeans were next to them. He lost the next round.
"No way am I gonna play Tekken completely naked." Tyler slurred. Somewhere between the first round of Strip Tekken and the second round, they'd run out of beer and had consequently switched to raspberry flavored vodka.
"Those are the rules." Chase smiled, eyeing Tyler up and down.
"Somthin' else." Tyler pleaded.
Chase's smile faded and the look in his slightly glassy eyes changed.
"What?" Tyler asked.
Chase leaned forward, wrapped one hand around the base of Tyler's neck, and kissed him firmly. Tyler wound his arms around Chase's neck and kissed him back eagerly. The controllers and virtual fighters were forgotten while Chase and Tyler toyed with eachother...
Tyler's head hurt. An explosion of pain. He suddenly remembered why he hated vodka. He always woke up hungover. He didn't bother with opening his eyes until he realized that there was someone holding on to him. He didn't panic. He was much too rational for that. He traced his steps backwards. He'd gone to Chase's after work...They drank beer, ate ice cream, and played Tekken. Then the vodka came out and they played Strip Tekken. And then... Then Tyler had lost four rounds in a row and rather than completely strip, he'd kissed Chase. Or Chase had kissed him... He decided it didn't matter. What did matter was how far things had gotten... Tyler slowly opened his eyes and instantly recognized the bottle-littered coffee table. He was slightly surprised to see the television and the PlayStation were both still on. Tyler looked down at himself and was relieved to see that he still had his boxers on and Chase was still wearing his jeans. Tyler rubbed slightly at his eyes and Chase suddenly pulled him closer. Tyler yelped as Chase squeezed him a little too hard. The grip suddenly loosened and Tyler realized that Chase was coming to. Tyler heard him murmuring to himself, but was a little surprised when he wasn't released.
"Uh, Chase? You're still kinda holding on to me." Tyler blushed.
"I know. I kinda like the way it feels." Chase murmured, kissing Tyler's neck.
Tyler tensed up.
"What happened last night?" Tyler demanded gently, wiggling around until he was looking into Chase's pale blue eyes.
"Well...Tekken is a game I play better when I'm drunk, so we drank, quite a bit, and then we started playing Strip Tekken, and then you started losing, so I started to kiss you, and then you started getting ahead of yourself, so I told you to slow down and you told me that I meant the world to you and I said that if that was really true you would wait until you were sober. At which point you vehemently insisted that you were sober enough and then I pointed out how slurred your words were. You pouted for a bit, kissed me for a bit, and passed out not long after."Chase shrugged.
"Oh I made a fool of myself."
"No. It's understandable." Chase shrugged.
Tyler started to get pieces of the night back as he remained awake. One moment in particular jarred him considerably.
"Did you really tell me you loved me?" Tyler demanded.
"Yes."
"But you were just drunk, right?"
"No. I meant it. I don't throw my words around like they mean nothing." Chase shrugged.
"So...Where does this leave us?"
Tyler hated Mondays. With a passion. They were the end of the weekend, and the beginning of the week. He sighed and got dressed for work. He hated dressing nice. Just once he wanted to walk into work wearing jeans and a t-shirt and have that be the end of it. Why did work have to mean uncomfortable? He climbed into his car and drove away from his apartment, cursing the very idea of work the whole way there.
He arrived at his desk and flopped into a chair. He hated just being the receptionist, but he was still going to school at night and couldn't really qualify as much else. The rubbed his eyes and hoped the day would just hurry up and pass quickly. He heard something hit the desk in front of him and he jumped. It was Chase, dropping off his coffee.
"Hey." Tyler smiled.
"Hey. We still on for lunch?" Chase asked.
"Of course." Tyler grinned.
Chase leaned over the desk and tilted his head, staring at the large calendar on the desk that was covered with Tyler's doodles.
"What are you--"
Chase stopped Tyler's question with a quick kiss.
"See you at noon." Chase smiled. Tyler blushed and smiled to himself. And here he was thinking office romances were nothing more than subject matter for trashy throw-away novels...
(1): I borrowed this line from something my friend showed me on YouTube. I can't remember the name of the skit or who did it, but I love that line. That one and "You're the fucking devil. And no one likes to play Monopoly with the fucking devil!"
A/N 2: This is sorta-kinda-very-loosely inspired by my own wanna-be office romance. I got a bit of an epic crush on a guy I work with. -blush- lol. Sorry if it sucks, but I'm writing this while I'm actually at work 'cos my home comp sucks. XD