[writing filter] the filename for this is "dannyissobadatmathomg"
...It's not actually about math, though. Well, mostly not about math.
***
Danny was starting to regret not minoring in math. He was also starting to realize why it was that Mr. London seemed so convinced that he couldn't handle the marketing director's job by himself. Crunching numbers was definitely not his strong suit, and he had never realized just how much math was involved with the job. Math made him cranky. Math made him tired. Math made it hard for him to concentrate on anything but how stupid he was at math.
All in all, it was not shaping up to be the best of days.
"Danny, Alan's on the phone," Felicity said, sticking her head into his office. He was going over an incorrect calculation, one that he just couldn't seem to get right. If only he had listened when his algebra teacher insisted he'd need to know how to do this in the real world...
"Alan who?" he asked, distractedly punching numbers into his calculator for the fifth time. Although he was only half-listening to Felicity, he definitely noticed the resounding silence that followed his question. In fact, the silence was peculiar enough for him to quickly backtrack in his mind, trying to figure out what it was that he--
Oh.
"Fuck!" he said quickly, just as Felicity said, "I am so going to tell him you said that!"
"Don't tell him that, please," Danny said, getting up from his desk. "I was distracted, I wasn't really listening to you!"
"I'm teeeeeelling him," Felicity sang, smirking at him from the doorway. He loved Felicity like a sister, but the urge to smack her was suddenly overwhelming.
"Do you know what happens if you tell him that?" Danny asked frantically.
"You have a really shitty night?"
"That's not even the half of it," Danny said. He crossed his office and took Felicity by the shoulders. "Not only do I have a really shitty night, but for the rest of my life, anytime I do something even minorly stupid he's going to make a crack about me not knowing who he is. Or whatever else that brain of his thinks up." He paused. "Plus, yeah, I'm going to have a really shitty night."
"Too bad," Felicity said, "Because I'm definitely telling him." She ducked back out of his office and over to her desk. Danny lunged after her, tripping his way out to her phone a moment too late.
"Hey there, Alan," she said into the phone, grinning triumphantly at Danny as she spoke. "You'll never guess what just happened....no, even better. I went to tell Danny you were on the phone and he said, 'Alan who?'.....I don't know, it's entirely possible. Let me ask him." She turned the phone away from her mouth. "Hey, Danny, do you have any other secret boyfriends named Alan that you'd like Alan to know about?"
"Give me the damn phone," he said through gritted teeth. She held it out for him, the smirk still on her face, and he yanked it away with a glare. Felicity smiled sweetly at him. "I am going to sell you into prostitution in a small Asian country. I'm really going to do it this time, not like all those other times I threatened." She stuck her tongue out at him--and really, he was her boss, shouldn't he have some sort of control over her?--which he ignored in favor of turning his attention towards his call. "Hi, sweetheart," he said into the phone, suppressing a sigh.
"Do you have any other secret boyfriends named Alan that I should know about?" Alan asked from across the line. There was a teasing note in his voice that Danny knew he'd be stuck hearing for at least the next few hours. Normally it was at least slightly cute. Today it was joining the massive line of things that were giving him a migraine.
"Last time I checked I didn't have any secret boyfriends named Alan," he said. "Just one not-secret one who loved me far too much to hold something I said while under math-induced stress against me."
"Not secret?" Alan said. "Let me just get the extension for your boss and pass that information along to him, then..."
"Alan." He should have been happy that Alan was only teasing him about the "secret" part. The only real fight they had in recent memory had been over the same issue. It was the first time they had ever raised their voices at each other and, to his knowledge, the only time he'd actually made Alan cry, something he hoped never to repeat.
He chuckled, and Danny had to admit that it was a nice thing to hear after the day he'd been having. "Sorry," he said. "Sometimes I can't help it, the sass just needs to escape. I'm sorry about the math. Do you need any help?"
"No, I do not need my boyfriend to help me with simple mathematics," Danny insisted, although the idea was very appealing.
"Okay, okay. I just know that it drives you crazy and considering I can do calculus in my sleep..." The scary part was that Danny was fairly sure that he could. He certainly managed to teach science in something quite close to his sleep on several occasions. One of them ended with Danny leaving work early to pick him up after he passed out in the middle of a lecture. Still, up until his eyes rolled into the back of his head, his lesson had been perfect.
"Thanks. Why don't you just rub that in a little more? I certainly need all the reminders I can get that you're a genius and I'm a dunce." Felicity snickered a little at that and Danny glared at her. 'Go away,' he mouthed, but she pointed at the nameplate on the desk and he remembered he was actually using her phone. Crap.
"Danny. You're not a dunce. Math just isn't your strong suit. I mean, there are plenty of things that I'm not good at."
"Name one." Danny settled back, ready to hear his answer. It was probably going to be entertaining, considering that there really were very few academic pursuits that Alan hadn't mastered.
There was a long pause. "Interpersonal relationships?" Alan offered weakly. "Um... remembering to run the dishwasher?"
Danny laughed. "You're not terrible at interpersonal relationships. You're actually very good at them. Well, at this one, at least, which is all that really matters."
"I have my moments."
"You have a lot of them." He could practically see Alan blush through the phone line. "You'd have more if just once I could come home and make a cup of tea in a clean mug, but we'll let that slide for now. Anyway, I leave work in about fifteen minutes."
"So I heard. It's possible I did something about that."
Danny leaned against the wall, a smile spreading across his face. "Oh, did you?" he said. He had to admit, the day wasn't completely shot after all, it seemed.
"Possibly. It's also possible I'm sitting in the parking lot, waiting for you to come downstairs so I can wisk you away to dinner. I figured that's a pretty good start to putting you in a better mood after a bad day. Not having to cook and clean is always a plus."
"How'd you know I was having a bad day?"
"Our psychic link," Alan deadpanned.
"Felicity told you?"
"Yeah. Fifteen minutes?"
Danny glanced at his watch. "More like three. I'll skip out early."
"God, that's hot. You're such a rebel."
"And you're a smart ass. I'll see you in a minute." Danny hung up the phone, a smile lingering on his face. "If Mr. London stops by," he said to Felicity, "tell him I took the rest of the extra work home with me to finish and that I had to head out early to... I don't know, make something up if he asks. He won't." He ducked back into his office to gather his papers together and heard Felicity follow him. He dug into his pocket and pulled out his car keys, turning around and tossing them to her, just as she passed through the door. She looked surprised, but managed to catch them.
"Your keys?" she asked.
"I'm not going to be able to drive you home and I don't want you to take a cab," he explained. "Just bring it back tomorrow, I'll have Alan drop me off in the morning on his way to school."
"You're not going to be using your car tonight?" Felicity asked him. She pocketed the keys, but continued to give him a very peculiar look as he swept all of his papers into a messy pile and shoved them into his briefcase.
"No," he said. "Alan's here and we're going out to dinner. When he gets like, three glasses of wine in him he can't keep his hands to himself. It makes driving difficult. It makes my driving difficult too, but for entirely different reasons." Briefcase packed, laptop already shut down, files in order for the next morning... all Danny needed to do was find his jacket and he was gone for the day.
"You guys sound well on your way to becoming your own urban legend," Felicity said, perching on the corner of his desk. "Sex-related auto-fatalities are always popular."
"That's what I've heard, but I'm still holding out for the comeback of the 'extracting a small animal from the anus' genre."
Felicity made a face which Danny grinned at as he wound his scarf around his neck and hit the lights to his office. Felicity followed him out to her desk, still looking mildly disgusted.
"Oh, honey, that's so much more than I've ever needed to know about your sex life."
***
Um, maybe more later? Cynthia eventually shows up? This is back, bee tee dubs, when Justine gets pregnant for the first time. She and Alan go out drinking before a PTA meeting later in this story, I think. ("Where's my brother?" "Justine took him out drinking. There's a PTA meeting tonight." "They go to PTA meetings drunk?" "Well, not Justine anymore. She's got a bun in the oven, so Alan's gotta be drunk enough for the both of them.")
Wheeee. Off to do real work!
***
Danny was starting to regret not minoring in math. He was also starting to realize why it was that Mr. London seemed so convinced that he couldn't handle the marketing director's job by himself. Crunching numbers was definitely not his strong suit, and he had never realized just how much math was involved with the job. Math made him cranky. Math made him tired. Math made it hard for him to concentrate on anything but how stupid he was at math.
All in all, it was not shaping up to be the best of days.
"Danny, Alan's on the phone," Felicity said, sticking her head into his office. He was going over an incorrect calculation, one that he just couldn't seem to get right. If only he had listened when his algebra teacher insisted he'd need to know how to do this in the real world...
"Alan who?" he asked, distractedly punching numbers into his calculator for the fifth time. Although he was only half-listening to Felicity, he definitely noticed the resounding silence that followed his question. In fact, the silence was peculiar enough for him to quickly backtrack in his mind, trying to figure out what it was that he--
Oh.
"Fuck!" he said quickly, just as Felicity said, "I am so going to tell him you said that!"
"Don't tell him that, please," Danny said, getting up from his desk. "I was distracted, I wasn't really listening to you!"
"I'm teeeeeelling him," Felicity sang, smirking at him from the doorway. He loved Felicity like a sister, but the urge to smack her was suddenly overwhelming.
"Do you know what happens if you tell him that?" Danny asked frantically.
"You have a really shitty night?"
"That's not even the half of it," Danny said. He crossed his office and took Felicity by the shoulders. "Not only do I have a really shitty night, but for the rest of my life, anytime I do something even minorly stupid he's going to make a crack about me not knowing who he is. Or whatever else that brain of his thinks up." He paused. "Plus, yeah, I'm going to have a really shitty night."
"Too bad," Felicity said, "Because I'm definitely telling him." She ducked back out of his office and over to her desk. Danny lunged after her, tripping his way out to her phone a moment too late.
"Hey there, Alan," she said into the phone, grinning triumphantly at Danny as she spoke. "You'll never guess what just happened....no, even better. I went to tell Danny you were on the phone and he said, 'Alan who?'.....I don't know, it's entirely possible. Let me ask him." She turned the phone away from her mouth. "Hey, Danny, do you have any other secret boyfriends named Alan that you'd like Alan to know about?"
"Give me the damn phone," he said through gritted teeth. She held it out for him, the smirk still on her face, and he yanked it away with a glare. Felicity smiled sweetly at him. "I am going to sell you into prostitution in a small Asian country. I'm really going to do it this time, not like all those other times I threatened." She stuck her tongue out at him--and really, he was her boss, shouldn't he have some sort of control over her?--which he ignored in favor of turning his attention towards his call. "Hi, sweetheart," he said into the phone, suppressing a sigh.
"Do you have any other secret boyfriends named Alan that I should know about?" Alan asked from across the line. There was a teasing note in his voice that Danny knew he'd be stuck hearing for at least the next few hours. Normally it was at least slightly cute. Today it was joining the massive line of things that were giving him a migraine.
"Last time I checked I didn't have any secret boyfriends named Alan," he said. "Just one not-secret one who loved me far too much to hold something I said while under math-induced stress against me."
"Not secret?" Alan said. "Let me just get the extension for your boss and pass that information along to him, then..."
"Alan." He should have been happy that Alan was only teasing him about the "secret" part. The only real fight they had in recent memory had been over the same issue. It was the first time they had ever raised their voices at each other and, to his knowledge, the only time he'd actually made Alan cry, something he hoped never to repeat.
He chuckled, and Danny had to admit that it was a nice thing to hear after the day he'd been having. "Sorry," he said. "Sometimes I can't help it, the sass just needs to escape. I'm sorry about the math. Do you need any help?"
"No, I do not need my boyfriend to help me with simple mathematics," Danny insisted, although the idea was very appealing.
"Okay, okay. I just know that it drives you crazy and considering I can do calculus in my sleep..." The scary part was that Danny was fairly sure that he could. He certainly managed to teach science in something quite close to his sleep on several occasions. One of them ended with Danny leaving work early to pick him up after he passed out in the middle of a lecture. Still, up until his eyes rolled into the back of his head, his lesson had been perfect.
"Thanks. Why don't you just rub that in a little more? I certainly need all the reminders I can get that you're a genius and I'm a dunce." Felicity snickered a little at that and Danny glared at her. 'Go away,' he mouthed, but she pointed at the nameplate on the desk and he remembered he was actually using her phone. Crap.
"Danny. You're not a dunce. Math just isn't your strong suit. I mean, there are plenty of things that I'm not good at."
"Name one." Danny settled back, ready to hear his answer. It was probably going to be entertaining, considering that there really were very few academic pursuits that Alan hadn't mastered.
There was a long pause. "Interpersonal relationships?" Alan offered weakly. "Um... remembering to run the dishwasher?"
Danny laughed. "You're not terrible at interpersonal relationships. You're actually very good at them. Well, at this one, at least, which is all that really matters."
"I have my moments."
"You have a lot of them." He could practically see Alan blush through the phone line. "You'd have more if just once I could come home and make a cup of tea in a clean mug, but we'll let that slide for now. Anyway, I leave work in about fifteen minutes."
"So I heard. It's possible I did something about that."
Danny leaned against the wall, a smile spreading across his face. "Oh, did you?" he said. He had to admit, the day wasn't completely shot after all, it seemed.
"Possibly. It's also possible I'm sitting in the parking lot, waiting for you to come downstairs so I can wisk you away to dinner. I figured that's a pretty good start to putting you in a better mood after a bad day. Not having to cook and clean is always a plus."
"How'd you know I was having a bad day?"
"Our psychic link," Alan deadpanned.
"Felicity told you?"
"Yeah. Fifteen minutes?"
Danny glanced at his watch. "More like three. I'll skip out early."
"God, that's hot. You're such a rebel."
"And you're a smart ass. I'll see you in a minute." Danny hung up the phone, a smile lingering on his face. "If Mr. London stops by," he said to Felicity, "tell him I took the rest of the extra work home with me to finish and that I had to head out early to... I don't know, make something up if he asks. He won't." He ducked back into his office to gather his papers together and heard Felicity follow him. He dug into his pocket and pulled out his car keys, turning around and tossing them to her, just as she passed through the door. She looked surprised, but managed to catch them.
"Your keys?" she asked.
"I'm not going to be able to drive you home and I don't want you to take a cab," he explained. "Just bring it back tomorrow, I'll have Alan drop me off in the morning on his way to school."
"You're not going to be using your car tonight?" Felicity asked him. She pocketed the keys, but continued to give him a very peculiar look as he swept all of his papers into a messy pile and shoved them into his briefcase.
"No," he said. "Alan's here and we're going out to dinner. When he gets like, three glasses of wine in him he can't keep his hands to himself. It makes driving difficult. It makes my driving difficult too, but for entirely different reasons." Briefcase packed, laptop already shut down, files in order for the next morning... all Danny needed to do was find his jacket and he was gone for the day.
"You guys sound well on your way to becoming your own urban legend," Felicity said, perching on the corner of his desk. "Sex-related auto-fatalities are always popular."
"That's what I've heard, but I'm still holding out for the comeback of the 'extracting a small animal from the anus' genre."
Felicity made a face which Danny grinned at as he wound his scarf around his neck and hit the lights to his office. Felicity followed him out to her desk, still looking mildly disgusted.
"Oh, honey, that's so much more than I've ever needed to know about your sex life."
***
Um, maybe more later? Cynthia eventually shows up? This is back, bee tee dubs, when Justine gets pregnant for the first time. She and Alan go out drinking before a PTA meeting later in this story, I think. ("Where's my brother?" "Justine took him out drinking. There's a PTA meeting tonight." "They go to PTA meetings drunk?" "Well, not Justine anymore. She's got a bun in the oven, so Alan's gotta be drunk enough for the both of them.")
Wheeee. Off to do real work!