Casually Obsessed, Indifferent Yet.
Title: Casually Obsessed, Indifferent Yet.
Author: letsgetsavvy
Pairing: Gabe Saporta / William Beckett
Summary: "What do you call Gabe Saporta in a suit?" William asks one afternoon after the last guy has left his desk.
Wordcount: 2,007 words.
Disclaimer: Fake as can be :D
Author Notes: Title belongs to The Music or the Misery by Fall Out Boy. Happy Birthday, Mister Beckett!
They both work in an office.
William's booth is directly opposite to Gabe's booth.
Both of them have the same job - they call up businesses that haven't paid their bills and ask them why they haven't paid their bills, only in nicer and more professional words.
At breaks, they man the phones, because Gabe eats at his desk and William doesn't eat. When the last wiry accountant leaves the office to get to McDonalds before the line gets too long, they talk. They used to talk about the weather, about current affairs, about what Britney did this week.
Then, they had an argument. But, neither of them would acknowledge it by using that exact word. William would say to you (if you should ask) that Gabe just directly verbally attacked him for no reason. However, if you searched for your answer directly across from William's booth, and asked Gabe about the conflict, he would just tell you (in that smooth, slightly Latino accent that got all the women to pay their bills) that William Beckett should never wear purple, because it makes him look like a pansy.
After this argument, William and Gabe rarely spoke, and when they did, they thought up the most menacing things possible to hurl at each other like knives, as if their target were strapped to a spinning bulls-eye at the circus.
They were always opposing each other, competing not for The Boss' attention, but for his amazing gift of being able to ridicule each and every one of his employees if they didn't have the right ideas.
It was a war of words, and the writing was on the wall.
-
"What do you call Gabe Saporta in a suit?" William asks one afternoon after the last guy has left his desk.
Gabe spins around on his chair to find William gazing at him intently, arms crossed and trying to hide a smile. He stares back, and shrugs his shoulders, too tired to talk - he'd just had a lovely little chat with a man from the 'burbs who sent in his payment a day too late.
"I don't know," he says, "what you call Gabe Saporta in a suit."
"The defendant," William says smartly, spinning around. Gabe just stares after him, as if his shoulder-length brown hair had whipped him in the face instead of doing nothing at all.
It takes Gabe a moment to gather his bearings.
"Hey, what do you call William Beckett in a suit?" he asks, and smiles widely as said man turns around. William just sets his mouth in a frown and shrugs his shoulders, just as Gabe had done.
"I don't know," came his response.
"The victim," Gabe says simply, and when he turns around, William is still staring at him like he was before, only now, his mouth is hanging open.
-
One day the next week, The Boss summons everybody in the office into one conference room. He rambles on for about three quarters of an hour before he gets to his point.
But, none of the employees mind, because The Boss is paying them to do nothing at all. They don't care, because at the end of the day, the money's in their pockets, and his hair isn't anywhere but his face.
William grins as he thinks of this, and lets out a small laugh. The Boss glares at him, and he'll find out later that he'd just been talking about hurricanes and how they're just about the only excuse for late bills because the businesses may be knocked down.
William's sudden outburst causes The Boss (whose real name is to hard for ordinary people to pronounce) to cut his conference short.
People that he's never talked to before smile at him as they pour out of the crowded room. He migrates to his desk with a stupid grin on his face.
He sits down, and that smile is wiped off his face by Gabe.
"That shirt makes your hips look wider than they really are."
-
It's the next Wednesday before they talk next.
"Hey, Gabe, I got a joke," William says, and when Gabe turns around, William is looking at his with his arms folded and resting on his jeans (which were red today - nobody can see your clothes when you work in a call centre, they've learned), just like he always is.
Gabe raises his left eyebrow, as if to say, 'bring it on, kiddo.' Now, naturally, the next part of his act would be to turn around and check his MySpace, 'cause nobody really calls through lunch, but he can't.
William just smiles.
"What's the difference between Gabe Saporta and a sofa?"
Gabe doesn't know (he never does), so he just shrugs his shoulders like he always finds himself doing.
"A sofa can support a family," William answers for him, his grin back and somehow covering the entire lower portion of his face.
Gabe has to admit, this one was good. But, he'd never let William hear that: he'd probably start wearing purple again.
Gabe turns around, and makes a mental note to remember that one. He hates his landlord, and she hates him back, but every third Friday they play poker and bet each other that week's rent money, curse like sailors, smoke like chimneys and drink like fish. That one should come in handy, he thinks.
He turns around again, about to get up and get a coffee from the machine in the hallway. His eyes catch William's brightly coloured pants.
"Yo, Bill," he says, purposely using the nickname that he's learned William hates, "you should be wearing a green shirt. Christmas is coming after all."
-
Gabe's landlord, Victoria, welcomes him into to her apartment wearing red stilettos and a black dress that hardly reaches her thighs and barely covers her chest.
"Hey, asshole," she says cheerfully, opening the door.
Gabe replies with a "hey, bitch," to which she responds with a smile that covers more than her dress does.
They walk to the poker table, which has a lightbulb dangling on a string above it, like in all the movies. There are four other people there. Gabe knows three of them - Hayley, one of Victoria's 'girls'; Nate, the quiet guy from the apartment three up from Gabe's; and Pete, who sells his stuff on the street corner.
The fourth guy has tattoos all up and down his arms, and the hostess introduces him as Travie. It turns out that he's one of Pete's best customers that's been getting comfy with Victoria.
She smiles, and deals the cards.
Before half the games are over, Travis sneezes in Gabe's general direction. Gabe just smiles, and toasts that awesome tattoo he has on his left arm, even though he secretly both couldn't tell what it was and liked the one on William's wrist better.
Gabe ends up losing half his rent money to Pete, and double it back from Victoria. After he kisses her on the cheek at the front door, 'cause by now they're too drunk to bicker, he sneezes so hard he almost falls back onto his ass. He just laughs, and hauls himself back to his apartment. He crashes on his sofa and laughs to himself.
Sure, a couch could support what he couldn't, but Gabe chose not to have the damn wife and two-point-five children, and his third second-hand couch had to support him whether it liked it or not.
-
William came in to work on Monday fully rested and with about six different cracks at Gabe stored in his head. He was mulling them over and choosing their order as he walked to his desk.
"Hey, Gabe, I-"
William stopped dead in his tracks when he saw that said individual was not at his desk. He frowned, wrote the first one on a blue Post-It note, and stuck it to Gabe's computer.
-
On the fifth day Gabe was away from work, William had given up on writing all his wise-ass jokes on Post-Its. Instead, he'd taken kindly to leaving them on Gabe's answering machine, right across from his own.
A lightbulb lit itself above William's head. He dials Gabe's number lighting-fast (was it bad that he knew it off of the top of his head?) and waits for the rings to die out.
"What do you call Gabe Saporta in a car?" he asks, looking at the clock and timing sixteen seconds, the time it usually took for Gabe to shrug his shoulders, shake his head, and say no, he didn't.
He delivers the punchline enthusiastically, before crashing the phone back onto its cradle. He laughed, but stopped prematurely. It would have been funnier had Gabe had been there.
He slumped back into his chair and leant his head back, sighing.
It was no fun without your jokes directed at somebody.
-
Gabe's lying on his floor, and now he can't tell if his sneezes are in relation to Travis' cold or his own allergies to dust.
His couch is on the back of a truck driving through the backstreets of the 'burbs - he doesn't own it anymore. Apparently, you can only own something if you can afford to pay for it. Gabe claims he never knew.
He's listening to the golden oldies station on the radio. The old guy with the croaky voice that announces the time informs him that it's half past one.
Right now, Gabe thinks he's be listening to William's shitty jokes as they both did nothing. He reckons he'd be drowning under the weight if all William's stories. Not that he'd mind, really.
The radio crackles into some old song that his mother would have liked. Gabe sighs and presses the mouth of the liquor bottle in his left hand against his, in some twisted show of affection.
He can feel a sneeze coming in the back of his head, and covered the mouth of the bottle with his thumb before it arrives. He's learned that getting alcohol out of carpet sucks.
The radio crackles onto a song that his father used to sing before he left. Gabe rolls his eyes, and totally forgetting about his carpet, throws the near-empty bottle at the radio. It still crackles, even though the bottle shatters.
He sneezes again.
-
One the eighth day (not including weekends), Gabe is sitting at his desk when William walks in, an assortment of bright Post-Its in his trash can. They both try to hide thier euphoria.
As soon as William sits down, Gabe rolls back to his desk and taps his shoulder twice.
They both roll back to the desk Gabe came from, and he presses the button on his answering machine.
"There's a couple good ones," he says, "but this one's my favourite."
"What do you call Gabe Saporta in a car?" William's voice asks from the speakers in Gabe's answering machine.
"I don't know," he says to the machine, "what do you call Gabe Saporta in a car?"
They wait in silence for the machine's voice to come back.
"A thief!" The answering machine says, before it cuts to the sound of a phone being smashed into it's cradle. William's cheeks turn a colour that almost matches the crimson hoodie Gabe's got on today.
"I-I," William stutters, and Gabe just smiles his mind-blowing smile at him.
"Gabe Saporta's so hairy that-" William starts to say, before said individual presses his lips to his own. In his own mind, Gabe is thinking that this is way better than kissing a bottle.
Gabe pulls away, and waits for William to regain his composure (which he does by breathing in and out, and pulling down his baby blue shirt), and just grins at him when he does.
"-when he was born, his mother got carpet burn."
Gabe laughs, threatening to take William with him.
"I missed you. It was so weird," he says, leaning back on his chair, and looking William up and down.
"You should wear that colour more."
Author: letsgetsavvy
Pairing: Gabe Saporta / William Beckett
Summary: "What do you call Gabe Saporta in a suit?" William asks one afternoon after the last guy has left his desk.
Wordcount: 2,007 words.
Disclaimer: Fake as can be :D
Author Notes: Title belongs to The Music or the Misery by Fall Out Boy. Happy Birthday, Mister Beckett!
They both work in an office.
William's booth is directly opposite to Gabe's booth.
Both of them have the same job - they call up businesses that haven't paid their bills and ask them why they haven't paid their bills, only in nicer and more professional words.
At breaks, they man the phones, because Gabe eats at his desk and William doesn't eat. When the last wiry accountant leaves the office to get to McDonalds before the line gets too long, they talk. They used to talk about the weather, about current affairs, about what Britney did this week.
Then, they had an argument. But, neither of them would acknowledge it by using that exact word. William would say to you (if you should ask) that Gabe just directly verbally attacked him for no reason. However, if you searched for your answer directly across from William's booth, and asked Gabe about the conflict, he would just tell you (in that smooth, slightly Latino accent that got all the women to pay their bills) that William Beckett should never wear purple, because it makes him look like a pansy.
After this argument, William and Gabe rarely spoke, and when they did, they thought up the most menacing things possible to hurl at each other like knives, as if their target were strapped to a spinning bulls-eye at the circus.
They were always opposing each other, competing not for The Boss' attention, but for his amazing gift of being able to ridicule each and every one of his employees if they didn't have the right ideas.
It was a war of words, and the writing was on the wall.
-
"What do you call Gabe Saporta in a suit?" William asks one afternoon after the last guy has left his desk.
Gabe spins around on his chair to find William gazing at him intently, arms crossed and trying to hide a smile. He stares back, and shrugs his shoulders, too tired to talk - he'd just had a lovely little chat with a man from the 'burbs who sent in his payment a day too late.
"I don't know," he says, "what you call Gabe Saporta in a suit."
"The defendant," William says smartly, spinning around. Gabe just stares after him, as if his shoulder-length brown hair had whipped him in the face instead of doing nothing at all.
It takes Gabe a moment to gather his bearings.
"Hey, what do you call William Beckett in a suit?" he asks, and smiles widely as said man turns around. William just sets his mouth in a frown and shrugs his shoulders, just as Gabe had done.
"I don't know," came his response.
"The victim," Gabe says simply, and when he turns around, William is still staring at him like he was before, only now, his mouth is hanging open.
-
One day the next week, The Boss summons everybody in the office into one conference room. He rambles on for about three quarters of an hour before he gets to his point.
But, none of the employees mind, because The Boss is paying them to do nothing at all. They don't care, because at the end of the day, the money's in their pockets, and his hair isn't anywhere but his face.
William grins as he thinks of this, and lets out a small laugh. The Boss glares at him, and he'll find out later that he'd just been talking about hurricanes and how they're just about the only excuse for late bills because the businesses may be knocked down.
William's sudden outburst causes The Boss (whose real name is to hard for ordinary people to pronounce) to cut his conference short.
People that he's never talked to before smile at him as they pour out of the crowded room. He migrates to his desk with a stupid grin on his face.
He sits down, and that smile is wiped off his face by Gabe.
"That shirt makes your hips look wider than they really are."
-
It's the next Wednesday before they talk next.
"Hey, Gabe, I got a joke," William says, and when Gabe turns around, William is looking at his with his arms folded and resting on his jeans (which were red today - nobody can see your clothes when you work in a call centre, they've learned), just like he always is.
Gabe raises his left eyebrow, as if to say, 'bring it on, kiddo.' Now, naturally, the next part of his act would be to turn around and check his MySpace, 'cause nobody really calls through lunch, but he can't.
William just smiles.
"What's the difference between Gabe Saporta and a sofa?"
Gabe doesn't know (he never does), so he just shrugs his shoulders like he always finds himself doing.
"A sofa can support a family," William answers for him, his grin back and somehow covering the entire lower portion of his face.
Gabe has to admit, this one was good. But, he'd never let William hear that: he'd probably start wearing purple again.
Gabe turns around, and makes a mental note to remember that one. He hates his landlord, and she hates him back, but every third Friday they play poker and bet each other that week's rent money, curse like sailors, smoke like chimneys and drink like fish. That one should come in handy, he thinks.
He turns around again, about to get up and get a coffee from the machine in the hallway. His eyes catch William's brightly coloured pants.
"Yo, Bill," he says, purposely using the nickname that he's learned William hates, "you should be wearing a green shirt. Christmas is coming after all."
-
Gabe's landlord, Victoria, welcomes him into to her apartment wearing red stilettos and a black dress that hardly reaches her thighs and barely covers her chest.
"Hey, asshole," she says cheerfully, opening the door.
Gabe replies with a "hey, bitch," to which she responds with a smile that covers more than her dress does.
They walk to the poker table, which has a lightbulb dangling on a string above it, like in all the movies. There are four other people there. Gabe knows three of them - Hayley, one of Victoria's 'girls'; Nate, the quiet guy from the apartment three up from Gabe's; and Pete, who sells his stuff on the street corner.
The fourth guy has tattoos all up and down his arms, and the hostess introduces him as Travie. It turns out that he's one of Pete's best customers that's been getting comfy with Victoria.
She smiles, and deals the cards.
Before half the games are over, Travis sneezes in Gabe's general direction. Gabe just smiles, and toasts that awesome tattoo he has on his left arm, even though he secretly both couldn't tell what it was and liked the one on William's wrist better.
Gabe ends up losing half his rent money to Pete, and double it back from Victoria. After he kisses her on the cheek at the front door, 'cause by now they're too drunk to bicker, he sneezes so hard he almost falls back onto his ass. He just laughs, and hauls himself back to his apartment. He crashes on his sofa and laughs to himself.
Sure, a couch could support what he couldn't, but Gabe chose not to have the damn wife and two-point-five children, and his third second-hand couch had to support him whether it liked it or not.
-
William came in to work on Monday fully rested and with about six different cracks at Gabe stored in his head. He was mulling them over and choosing their order as he walked to his desk.
"Hey, Gabe, I-"
William stopped dead in his tracks when he saw that said individual was not at his desk. He frowned, wrote the first one on a blue Post-It note, and stuck it to Gabe's computer.
-
On the fifth day Gabe was away from work, William had given up on writing all his wise-ass jokes on Post-Its. Instead, he'd taken kindly to leaving them on Gabe's answering machine, right across from his own.
A lightbulb lit itself above William's head. He dials Gabe's number lighting-fast (was it bad that he knew it off of the top of his head?) and waits for the rings to die out.
"What do you call Gabe Saporta in a car?" he asks, looking at the clock and timing sixteen seconds, the time it usually took for Gabe to shrug his shoulders, shake his head, and say no, he didn't.
He delivers the punchline enthusiastically, before crashing the phone back onto its cradle. He laughed, but stopped prematurely. It would have been funnier had Gabe had been there.
He slumped back into his chair and leant his head back, sighing.
It was no fun without your jokes directed at somebody.
-
Gabe's lying on his floor, and now he can't tell if his sneezes are in relation to Travis' cold or his own allergies to dust.
His couch is on the back of a truck driving through the backstreets of the 'burbs - he doesn't own it anymore. Apparently, you can only own something if you can afford to pay for it. Gabe claims he never knew.
He's listening to the golden oldies station on the radio. The old guy with the croaky voice that announces the time informs him that it's half past one.
Right now, Gabe thinks he's be listening to William's shitty jokes as they both did nothing. He reckons he'd be drowning under the weight if all William's stories. Not that he'd mind, really.
The radio crackles into some old song that his mother would have liked. Gabe sighs and presses the mouth of the liquor bottle in his left hand against his, in some twisted show of affection.
He can feel a sneeze coming in the back of his head, and covered the mouth of the bottle with his thumb before it arrives. He's learned that getting alcohol out of carpet sucks.
The radio crackles onto a song that his father used to sing before he left. Gabe rolls his eyes, and totally forgetting about his carpet, throws the near-empty bottle at the radio. It still crackles, even though the bottle shatters.
He sneezes again.
-
One the eighth day (not including weekends), Gabe is sitting at his desk when William walks in, an assortment of bright Post-Its in his trash can. They both try to hide thier euphoria.
As soon as William sits down, Gabe rolls back to his desk and taps his shoulder twice.
They both roll back to the desk Gabe came from, and he presses the button on his answering machine.
"There's a couple good ones," he says, "but this one's my favourite."
"What do you call Gabe Saporta in a car?" William's voice asks from the speakers in Gabe's answering machine.
"I don't know," he says to the machine, "what do you call Gabe Saporta in a car?"
They wait in silence for the machine's voice to come back.
"A thief!" The answering machine says, before it cuts to the sound of a phone being smashed into it's cradle. William's cheeks turn a colour that almost matches the crimson hoodie Gabe's got on today.
"I-I," William stutters, and Gabe just smiles his mind-blowing smile at him.
"Gabe Saporta's so hairy that-" William starts to say, before said individual presses his lips to his own. In his own mind, Gabe is thinking that this is way better than kissing a bottle.
Gabe pulls away, and waits for William to regain his composure (which he does by breathing in and out, and pulling down his baby blue shirt), and just grins at him when he does.
"-when he was born, his mother got carpet burn."
Gabe laughs, threatening to take William with him.
"I missed you. It was so weird," he says, leaning back on his chair, and looking William up and down.
"You should wear that colour more."