Nerds In Love
Title: Nerds In Love
Pairing: Ryan/Brendon
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 21,800
Disclaimer: Not real, not mine. Also, about 80% of the Geek Squad info is fictitious. I have no idea how the company operates or what Geek Squad is even like, only that they wear dorky uniforms and fiddle around with electronics. The title belongs to the Revenge of the Nerds movie series.
Notes: The basic idea belongs to hellodolly123. I wrote a piece of this as a belated birthday gift to her and got wrapped up in the idea so much that I had to keep going. Thus, I have this ridiculous AU. *facepalm*
Summary: "Sorry, man. Maybe you should call Geek Squad."
It all started with a stupid email from Spencer. The subject line of the email said, "You have to check this out!” It sounded enough like Spencer. When he opened it, the only thing it contained was a link and a smiley face. Nothing telling what it was or why Ryan needed to see it. It was probably some ridiculous site or video. Spencer liked to frequent weird but strangely hilarious sites, so Ryan clicked the link.
A new window popped up and loaded quickly. It was a porn site.
"Okaaay," Ryan said aloud. Spencer never sent him porn, and Ryan wasn't even sure Spencer looked at porn. It was sort of confusing, even suspicious.
He took a quick look at the page (because, hey, he was already there) and it looked like a big collection of amateur porn clips. He was going to have to call Spencer later to tell him how grossed out he was that his best friend was sending him porn, and how if he was going to be a pervert, he could at least find better sites. Bored of the site already, Ryan moved the mouse to exit the window, but when he clicked little X at the top corner, a new little window popped up. And another. And then another, until his entire screen was covered in tiny little pop-up windows. Little advertisements flashed on the screen ranging from rip-off Rolexes to ads for more porn sites. Ryan started getting a little panicky and began closing pages as quickly as possible, but they kept coming up too fast for him to keep up with. Some came with sounds from car horns beeping (You've just been entered to win a V8!) to moaning from more goddamn cheap porn. Then all of a sudden, his computer screen froze. Ryan was still trying to fight each little pop-up and it took him a second to realize that his mouse wasn't moving.
After a few moments of staring at his screen and wiggling the mouse insistently, Ryan actually screamed.
* * *
"Dude! What the fuck have you done to my computer?!" Ryan yelled into the phone when Spencer picked up.
"What the hell are you talking about, Ryan? This is Ryan, isn't it?" Spencer said, very confused on the other end of the line.
"That fucking site you sent me crashed my damn computer!" screeched Ryan.
"Oh, man, didn't I call you and tell you? My email got hacked and it sent weird sites to my whole list of contacts. I thought I called you and left a message."
Ryan rolled his eyes and pulled his cell phone away from his ear. Sure enough, there at the top of the screen was a little icon shaped like an envelope, alerting Ryan that he had a new voicemail in his box. Ryan's jaw dropped.
"No fucking way," he said, more to himself than Spencer.
Spencer still answered. "Sorry, man. Maybe you should call Geek Squad or something."
"Yeah," Ryan said, a little shaken and still in half-disbelief. His computer had just crashed, but it was so heavy on him that it felt like his dog had just died. He didn't know how to process it yet. "Maybe I will call them."
* * *
Ryan really had no idea how computers worked aside from how to get around on one. It didn't even occur to him that the Geek Squad might not have even been the right people to call until after he had called in and scheduled an appointment with an Agent.
The woman on the phone had been nice, listening to Ryan explain the trouble and then trying to suggest solutions. However, Ryan just started getting frustrated because it wasn't like he really knew the technical lingo and nothing was making sense to him. He didn't know how to explain the problem with his computer. All he knew is that he went to a site, his computer froze, and it wouldn't load when he tried to boot it back up.
Patient as ever, the woman suggested that Ryan either come into one of the Best Buy locations and get technical help from the Geek Squad there or hire an Agent, as they called them, to come and take a look at the computer and figure out how to fix the problem that way. So relieved, Ryan immediately agreed to hire the Agent and gave his address. The woman told him that his Agent would come to his house in three days at noon to help him with his computer difficulties. She politely bid him good day and ended the call.
Three days passed and Ryan was sitting in his bedroom in front of his computer, wondering if there was any hope of saving the thing or if he should just borrow Spencer’s computer and start looking at the new laptops online. He was absent-mindedly tidying his room up (because he didn't want to look like a complete slob) when the doorbell rang and got Ryan's attention.
He went to the door and looked quickly through the peephole. On the other side, there stood a man with a short-sleeved, white shirt tucked into black slacks and a black tie. Out on the side of the road, Ryan could see the signature Geek Squad car parked.
"Are they serious?" Ryan thought as he stepped back to open the door.
Oh yes, they were serious. There was the Agent with red-rimmed glasses on his nose and a briefcase in hand. The sad part was that the guy wasn't some fat, balding, middle-aged man or a stick-skinny, ugly thing with nothing going for him but his computer knowledge. He looked so young and fresh. Ryan wondered why he got a job working for the Geek Squad. Sure, he was sort of thin and pale with glasses, but that didn't automatically make someone a loser. However, the job with the Geek Squad was edging him in that direction, as was his awful haircut.
"Hello," the man said in a sort of practiced tone. "My name's Brendon Urie and I'm your Geek Squad Agent."
"Hey, I'm Ryan. Come on in and take a look at this thing," said Ryan, waving vaguely behind him. He moved to the side and let Brendon in before closing the door behind him. Brendon took a quick look at the room but didn't seem to care enough to dwell very long, so he waited for Ryan to lead him to the computer.
"This way," said Ryan, motioning for Brendon to follow him. "It's in the bedroom."
Brendon skittered behind him to his bedroom and sat down at Ryan's computer chair before Ryan even had a chance to try and describe the issue at hand.
"It won't start up. A few days ago, it froze while I was surfing the internet," Ryan said, plainly lying. As much as Ryan was sure there were more embarrassing ways to crash a computer, a dignified part of him wouldn't just admit that I was at a pornography site and the pop-ups ate my computer. Brendon didn't need to know. Brendon probably didn't even care to know how it happened, anyway. His job was to fix it now that it had happened. The how was really only relevant to Ryan, who swore to himself that he would never click on a link in an email ever again no matter how safe it looked.
Brendon hadn't said anything since his short little introduction but was already getting to work at pressing buttons and poking around the computer tower. It was sort of awkward and maybe a little rude, in Ryan's opinion, that Brendon didn't at least tell him theories on what could fix this. Normal computer repair guys sat there and tried to educate Ryan, telling him all he never cared to know about his RAM or how many giga-whatevers a decent computer should have.
Actually, reconsidering it, Ryan realized that maybe Brendon was the more polite of the two types. Still, his silence was a little unnerving.
"So, do you think you can fix it or is this one of those Blue Screen of Death things where I should just abandon hope now?" Ryan asked, hoping to at least get Brendon to laugh a little. Brendon did crack a smile, but he bent his head like he was hiding it and just kept working. It was sort of endearing. Maybe, Ryan reasoned, the guy was just shy. He wasn't being rude; he just didn't know what to say.
"You seem pretty young to be on the Geek Squad," Ryan said, trying to sound conversational. He was hoping this wouldn't be a big, awkward affair but Brendon was not helping turn things around.
"I'm twenty," Brendon finally said.
"Success!" Ryan silently rejoiced. Then he joked, "I thought all the Geek Squad had were thirty year old men without girlfriends."
Brendon visibly bristled at that and Ryan felt a stab of regret and embarrassment. Brendon just said, "Not everyone thinks a girlfriend is top priority."
"Oh, well, yeah, there are more... important things than just, uh... than just girls," stumbled Ryan. Awesome. He had already established himself as an asshole. "I'm just gonna..." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder and backed out of the room slowly. Brendon didn't look up as he left, a little flustered with his face tinged pink.
Once safely out of the room and away from Brendon, Ryan sighed and rubbed his eyes. He was such an idiot. He wondered, though, why he was so set on making a good impression. It wasn't like Ryan was ever going to see this guy once his computer was back up and running. And he had tried to be friendly but Brendon had hardly responded. If Brendon wanted to work in peace, then fine. Ryan wasn't going to sit around and try to coax conversation out of him. He had better things to do.
However, most of these things would have taken place in his bedroom where all his shit was. So maybe he would have to find something less-important-but-still-better to do, which turned out to be flipping the TV on and seeing what he could watch. He settled on The Last Samurai, content to watch Tom Cruise in all his weirdness strutting around the screen.
He got all the way through the movie and Brendon still hadn't come out to even tell Ryan how things were going. Ryan started getting a little worried. Was something wrong? Was Ryan's computer that fucked? Had Brendon stolen the computer and escaped out the window?
Curious, Ryan got up and tiptoed to the bedroom, the door still open wide. He leaned in the doorway with both hands on the frame to see Brendon bent over the tower with his ass sticking out, poking around some more like he was trying to take the whole damn thing apart.
"Any progress?" Ryan said from the doorway, causing Brendon to jump and look up. He had a scared, confused sort of look on his face that just didn't make sense to Ryan (unless he really was planning on snatching his computer when Ryan wasn't looking).
Brendon made something close to a smile and said, "Just going through the different methods."
Ryan nodded and ahhed like he knew what those were. Brendon went back to stretching over the computer and looking like he was trying to stick his head in the tower. Ryan just tried not to laugh and thought to himself that this guy didn't look like he had a clue as to what he was doing. And the two hours or so Brendon had already spent checking this thing out seemed to say that, at the very least, Brendon wasn't their star employee. He couldn't fix your computer in some weird, timed competition. Ryan wondered if really big computer nerds had those or if that was only for solving Rubik's cubes.
Ryan left Brendon alone again.
He went to the kitchen and made himself a sandwich, eating slowly before slumping back down on the couch and watching two episodes of So You Think You Can Dance re-runs. Finally, Ryan got back up and stalked to his room to see Brendon staring at a screen of numbers and text, which probably meant something in Geek-speak but only looked like The Matrix to Ryan.
"Anything yet?" Ryan said impatiently. The guy had been at his house for hours. He hoped Brendon wasn't charging an hourly rate. Ryan was going to be really pissed if the guy was just wasting his time to get paid more.
"I got it booted up and running. I think you had a pretty nasty virus," Brendon said, eyes still glued to the screen. "You should probably install a virus-protection program after this to keep it from happening again in the future."
"Yeah, thanks," Ryan said, sounding a little like a smart-ass. Brendon's fingers on the keys faltered for just a second, like that little remark got to him, but then continued on like it didn't happen.
Ryan crossed his arms, not feeling sorry yet for being a jerk (because, seriously, the guy had been here for way too long), and said, "How much longer do you think this will take?"
"Not much longer. The hardest part was finding the virus and purging it. Now I'm just doing some last minute cleaning up to make sure there aren't any more little viruses eating away at your computer. Maybe ten more minutes and then I'll be out of your hair." The way Brendon said it made him sound like a dog with its tail between its legs, like he knew he was being a nuisance and he wanted to leave so Ryan wouldn't pick at him anymore.
"Ten minutes. Ok. I'll wait," Ryan thought, sitting himself down on the edge of his bed. He watched Brendon go through codes and files, his fingers flying across the keyboard without even a glance downward. Brendon may not have been their champion Agent, but he still knew a thing or two about how to handle computers.
The light from the screen reflected softly off of Brendon's glasses, giving him a sort of glazed look as he went through and scanned the computer for more possible viruses. The screen looked like a wall of jumbled letters and numbers, falling from the top of the screen to the bottom in blocks of paragraphs. Suddenly, the screen stopped moving and Brendon kept typing.
"Well, I think I figured out what caused the virus," he said, and Ryan's breath seized in his throat.
"Shit shit shit," thought Ryan, fear seizing him.
Brendon squinted at the computer where a URL was written out. "...Big-Ass Titties?" He looked back at Ryan with the smuggest smirk Ryan had ever seen. Ryan could only imagine the look of horror on his own face.
"My friend's email got hacked. I got a link in an email and I ended up there. I didn't even know what it was," Ryan explained, his eyes a little wider than normal. "It was an accident."
Brendon didn't say a word, but the look on his face said it all. He felt like he had caught Ryan in something. There was a gleam behind his glasses that made him look like he was grinning on the inside like Ryan was the loser here. Never mind that Brendon was wearing that dorky short-sleeved button down shirt and driving a car proclaiming his loserdom. No, Ryan was the dork looking at porn sites and getting viruses like some creep who loaded himself up with spyware from lurking around shady sites. If Ryan had been the bullying type, he would have made a stab at Brendon about how he probably only had porn to keep him company most nights and he shouldn't be making fun. Later, Ryan wondered if saying it would have even scathed Brendon at all.
It was like, all of a sudden, Brendon had this newfound sense of confidence that he had something over Ryan's head that made Ryan look more like an idiot than Brendon in his tie. Brendon seemed to have resigned himself to being a geek until this. It was like this made them equals in Brendon's head.
He relaxed a little in his chair as if he was much less concerned about seeming professional now, and he looked back at Ryan with those smiling eyes. They mocked him and searched him at the same time, making Ryan feel embarrassed and almost violated. There was something else behind those bright red frames that made Ryan's skin crawl. This look that Brendon was giving him mixed in so well with the superior stare that Ryan almost didn't notice it. It was almost... teasingly seductive, like he was silently saying, "You dirty boy, what were you doing there?" When Brendon gave him a half-smile and arched an eyebrow, both of Ryan's eyebrows shot up in defense.
Where did this guy get this? From where was he drawing this sudden burst of confidence? When he had walked in, he had barely said a word and only looked Ryan in the face long enough to say his own name. How on earth did this pale little Geek Squad Agent turn into this? It didn't make sense and it was fascinating. Clearly, Brendon was not just some shy, nerdy little tech support guy. The guy had a different personality, had a hidden story behind his square glasses and stupid uniform. And Ryan, being the analytical type of guy that he was, was curious to figure him out.
Ryan's mind suddenly got a flash of Brendon bent over the computer tower before, ass high and obvious.
Oh, Ryan was so hooked.
"Alright, well," Brendon said, stretching his arms over his head and fixing his tie, "I've got your computer back up and working. Like I said before, you'll probably want to install some more firewalls and virus scanners to make sure this isn't a normal thing that happens to your computer. Our website has a few places you can go to and download them for free. It really saves you a lot of headaches, especially if you're a regular at sites like Big-Ass Titties." He looked like he was trying really hard not to laugh. Ryan winced.
Then Brendon said, "The bill will come in the mail. If you need anything or have any questions, our helpline number is posted on our website. Free feel to call if you have any more problems or concerns. My work, however, is done."
"Uh, thanks," Ryan managed to say as Brendon packed up his briefcase.
"No problem. Glad to be of service, Ryan," Brendon said, subtly accenting Ryan's name. It was like he was silently saying, "I'll remember you."
Ryan saw Brendon to the door and peeked out of the front window to watch Brendon walk back to the car with a different step than he arrived with and then drive away.
* * *
Ryan went to the Geek Squad website just hours after Brendon left and installed those virus-protection programs. While there, Ryan strayed to the Agent section of the site, seeing what they were supposed to be capable of doing for him.
He had to think of a reason for Brendon to come back. He was already going crazy with curiosity about him and the idea of just forgetting about him seemed absurd. Then the perfect solution came to him.
- Contain virus outbreaks
- Remove prying spyware
- Install virus-and spyware-protection software
- Show you how to use your digital camera.
It couldn't have been more perfect. Spencer had just gotten a new digital camera the other week and it was the coolest shit Ryan had seen since the Wii. No doubt it was complicated, with lots of confusing buttons and weird settings. All he would have to do is borrow it and call for Brendon to come and help him figure it out. And since Spencer was indirectly responsible for his computer crashing in the first place, it would be the least he could do to try and make it up to Ryan.
Brilliance only came easily to a true genius, and Ryan fancied himself a real genius at that moment.
He did not, however, fancy himself one when he was sitting on the phone with another representative and was going to ask for Brendon specifically but, for the life of him, could not remember Brendon's last name. Brendon had said it maybe once, but Ryan hadn’t really been paying attention. He told representative-a man, this time-that the last Agent whom he'd last hired was very helpful and friendly, but he only remembered that his first name was Brendon and he wore red glasses.
"I'm sorry, sir, but the representatives don't work with the Agents. They're in a completely different sect of the company, so I can't help you with who you might have hired before. Rest assured, though, that all of our Agents are very capable, friendly workers who can help you learn about your new digital camera."
Ryan wanted to growl and say, "I don't want another Agent, I want Brendon." The man was starting to get on Ryan's nerves with his detached, business-like attitude. Ryan was sure that the woman he talked to before would have at least been sympathetic and jotted down a note to send along for the right person to read.
Despite his frustration, Ryan thanked the man and gave his address again, hoping against hope that things would work out and Brendon would be the one to show up at his house.
* * *
The man on the phone had told Ryan that the Agent would come to his house the next day at about four in the afternoon. So Ryan waited anxiously at the front window, watching for the car to pull up in front of his house. His hands were a little shaky and his heart was thudding in his chest with practically no rhythm. When the car finally did drive up to his house, Ryan felt like everything around him stopped. Everything was deathly still as he waited to see who emerged from the little black and white car.
It was hard to tell, at first, because of the distance, but the dark mop of hair on top of the faceless Agent's head was a good sign. As the figure came closer, Ryan saw the quickest flash of red across the Agent's face.
"There is a God!" Ryan hollered out loud with his arms thrown up in the air. His burst of joy was stifled as Brendon came closer to the door. Ryan busied himself with his nervous habit of smoothing down his hair and pulling on the hem of his t-shirt that did not want to touch the top of his pants. Then he waited for Brendon to knock.
The rhythmic tap tap tap of Brendon's knuckles echoed through the house and Ryan waited a few seconds to walk to the front door and open it casually.
"Well, hey," Ryan said with a bright smile. Brendon gave him back an indiscernible look, and it got Ryan's mind abuzz with questions already.
"Whoareyou? Howareyou? Whatareyouthinking? Whatdoyouthinkofme? What'syourlifelike? Letmeunderstandyou."
Brendon said, "They tell me you need the lowdown on your new camera." The tiny smirk growing from the corners of his mouth was playful.
Ryan chuckled a little, hoping Brendon was meaning to be funny, and waved for Brendon to come inside. They entered the living room where Spencer's new and expensive camera was waiting on the coffee table. Ryan picked it up and handed it to Brendon with an unsure, expectant look. Brendon took a quick look at it and turned it on while Ryan watched with crossed arms.
"Now, do you need to know something specific or do you just want the general run-through?" Brendon said in a small voice, like he was falling back into that nerdy façade, just getting his work done and getting out.
“Oh, um, I just need to know all the normal stuff. I don’t know how to do anything but turn it on and take a picture,” he said, feeling a little embarrassed that it was actually true.
“The most helpful thing you can always do is read the manual. That’s normally the fastest way to answer a question or fix a problem,” Brendon said as he pushed his glasses up his nose.
“Yeah, I, uh… lost my manual?” was all Ryan could think to say. He had forgotten to ask Spencer for it and he felt a little stupid now. It probably made him look even stupider to Brendon.
Brendon gave a slightly indulgent smile and turned the camera on as he sat down on the couch. He said, “We’ll start with how to use the playback setting.”
Ryan hesitantly sat down next to him, unsure of what a safe but friendly distance would be. The camera whizzed and whirred a little before making a happy ping and flashing a picture of Spencer and Haley across the screen.
“My best friend and his girlfriend,” Ryan explained. He couldn’t understand why he was feeling so awkward and anxious. If anything, that should have been Brendon. Granted, Brendon was still a little awkward anyway but Ryan thought it unfair that he felt it too.
“They’re a cute couple,” Brendon said with a small, sweet smile. It was the first real conversational thing Brendon had ever said to Ryan and it made Ryan want to grin. Progress! Ryan nodded and looked back at Haley and Spencer, sitting in Spencer’s car and taking pictures in the front seats.
“They’re really great for each other,” Ryan said with an approving nod.
“Any pictures on here you might not want someone else to see? Like, you and your girlfriend, for example?” Brendon said. He flashed another smile much like the one from the other day. A teasing, playful one with the tiniest show of teeth.
“Oh, no, no!” Ryan said. He quickly assured Brendon that he didn’t have a girlfriend anyway, and he wouldn’t be taking pictures like that if he did.
He could have sworn he heard Brendon mutter something that sounded like, “Hm. Interesting.”
Brendon continued on and showed Ryan all the functions and features of the camera, nearly boring Ryan to death because it wasn’t as if he was actually planning on using the damn thing. All the while, Ryan kept trying to initiate some sort of conversation but Brendon stayed on task and only answered in the most polite, brief way.
“Stupid idiot with your stupid good work ethic,” Ryan thought bitterly as Brendon was droning on about different flash settings. At the very least, Brendon was really knowledgeable about the camera, even to the point of half-confusing Ryan. He tried not to listen too closely lest his brain be scrambled.
It was almost an hour before Brendon was finished showing Ryan everything on the camera because he had to demonstrate half of the functions, so now Ryan had about thirty arbitrary pictures of his living room. There was, however, a little gem waiting on the camera for later-a picture Brendon took of himself to show how to focus on an object up close or far away. Ryan was glad that Brendon was flying too quickly through his instructions to delete any pictures.
“Well, that should cover just about everything,” Brendon said conclusively. “Do you have any questions?”
“About a hundred, and none to do with the damn camera,” thought Ryan. It came out as, “Nope, thanks for the help.”
Brendon gave a cordial smile and rose to leave. A panic alarm went off in Ryan’s head saying, “Don’t let him leave yet!” And as much as he tried to fight with it and argue that “there’s no valid reason for him to stay,” it still insisted that Ryan stop Brendon before he walked out that door.
After saying his courteous goodbye, Brendon headed for the front door. Feeling a bit conflicted for a moment, Ryan stretched out a hand for Brendon when he wasn’t looking and then let it shrink back to his chest. He jumped up from the couch and followed Brendon to the door. Once there, he fumbled for words until all that came out was, “What’s your name again?”
Brendon gave him one of those fake, dry smiles that a person uses when they’re a bit offended, and he said, “Brendon Urie.”
“Brendon Urie,” Ryan repeated in his head like he was mentally writing it down, tucking it away for future use. “Sorry, I just completely forgot it before and when I needed help with the camera, I couldn’t remember your name to ask for you but you came anyway so I guess that worked out and stuff… and… yeah.”
He felt his confidence drying up like a puddle in the desert. Rambling and hints at creepy work-stalking were just not going to help Ryan. But Brendon scratched the back of his head and grinned like a bashful little eight year old.
“I asked for the assignment,” he said quietly, like a confession. He glanced up at Ryan with his eyebrows drawn together a little, and Ryan felt his mouth splitting into a grin. Brendon had requested to work for him again.
Somehow, when Brendon was being nervous and jittery, Ryan felt himself calm down, like he didn’t need to impress Brendon or anything because now Brendon was the one trying to hold himself together.
“Well, I’m very glad for your help,” said Ryan, folding his arms casually.
Brendon looked Ryan right in the eyes for the longest he ever had and said with a quick nod, “Take care, Ryan.”
With that, he walked out the door and down the sidewalk where his Geek-mobile was parked. Ryan waved from his doorway and didn’t suppress the wide smile when Brendon waved back.
* * *
“You know what the most retarded part of this story is?” Spencer said, munching noisily on his chips. Ryan just grunted around his sub in response. Spencer gave a mocking smirk and said, “That you’re trying so hard to impress such a loser.”
Ryan was mildly affronted and his huff indicated so. “I’m not trying to impress him, and he’s… he’s not a loser, ok?”
“He works for the Geek Squad, Ryan,” Spencer said dryly.
“Which probably means he’s smart.” Ryan was getting defensive. “Who says you can’t be smart and interesting and cool?”
“This coming from the guy who used to pick up the hottest blonde girl in the room when William would take us to college parties.”
“Maybe I’ve realized that I need to grow out of that,” Ryan mumbled, like he wasn’t sure if he was ready to admit it yet.
“And as mature and great as that is-I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you want to grow out of it-that doesn’t explain the jump. How do you go from Jac Vanek and Keltie Colleen to the guy who fixed your computer? How do these connect?” Spencer said, waving his sub around emphatically.
Ryan sighed in exasperation and pulled Spencer’s camera out of his messenger bag. He turned it to playback and handed the camera to Spencer without a word. Spencer took it cautiously and looked at the screen. There was a picture of a guy with slightly mussed hair and vibrant eyes behind oddly stylish glasses. His smile was so warm and pleasant that Spencer almost caught himself smiling back.
“He’s… cute,” Spencer said. His tone was a mix of astonishment and discomfort. “If I was into dudes, I would probably be interested too.”
“Don’t think of it like that, dude. There’s more to him. Yeah, he’s sort of good-looking, but he has this weird air about him that I can’t describe.”
“A sexy air?” Spencer waggled his eyebrows and bit his lip.
Ryan gave a practically explosive laugh. “Hardly. He seems so introverted and awkward, at least from what I’ve seen so far. But he has these moments where it’s almost like his mask slips. I don’t doubt he actually is kind of a dork at the core, but I feel like he’s hiding another very different side of himself.”
“I would be surprised if you knew every side of him after seeing each other twice, though, dude,” said Spencer as he licked mustard off his fingers. “Of course there are sides to him you don’t know about.”
Ryan shook his head and his hair fell into his eyes. “I know that but it’s just… like I said, I can’t even describe it. But I have this feeling that he’s this really awesome guy underneath his geek façade.”
Spencer was quiet for a few seconds and then started snickering behind his lips. “Underneath it, huh?”
Ryan cuffed him on the arm and said, “Oh, shut up, dickwad!” He still laughed in spite of himself.
* * *
Ryan got the bills in the mail a few days later. When he opened them up and read the totals, he nearly stopped breathing. Because, oh yeah, he was paying Brendon to come to his house. That part had sort of slipped his mind.
He sat on his couch with the bills in hand and stared at them for a good five minutes before coming to the conclusion that hiring Brendon to make house calls was not going to be affordable much longer.
There had to be another way. He and Brendon were just starting to get somewhere and he couldn’t just forget about him now. The first thing he thought of was going down to Best Buy to see if Brendon worked there, too. It was probably a long shot, especially since the whole Geek company seemed to be pretty sectioned off from what he could tell, but Ryan didn’t have much of a choice if he wanted to see Brendon again and still have money afterwards.
It was worth a shot.
* * *
The doors whizzed open for him as he stepped up to the entrance of the giant building with the words Best Buy lit up out front in black and yellow.
“Oh god, I am such a loser for doing this,” Ryan mumbled to himself with a bit of a wince.
There were employees buzzing around, scuttling back and forth between departments and computers in skirts or ties. To Ryan’s surprise, it was a woman with blonde curls who came up and approached him. She wore a modest skirt that reached her knees and a nametag with the name Greta printed on it.
“Hello,” she said rather pleasantly. “Can I help you, sir?”
“Um, not right now, I just… want to, uh,” he floundered. “I was just wondering if Brendon Urie was working.”
“No, I don’t think we have a Brendon working today. In fact, I’m not sure I even know if a Brendon Urie works here at all. I’m sorry.”
Ryan told her it was ok, and she tried to continue. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”
At that moment, Ryan saw someone coming closer from his peripheral vision. When he glanced over, he saw a man just an inch or two shorter than himself with a thin, scratchy beard forming on his face. He didn’t look like he worked there and Ryan didn’t recognize him, but he looked straight at Ryan and said, “Brendon Urie? You’re looking for Brendon?”
Ryan nodded, wondering why this complete stranger was talking to him. He hoped this was actually going somewhere, because quite honestly, the guy vaguely looked like he had walked in from sleeping in the street.
The man smiled. “I know him. I see him every few days when he comes to pick up a Geek car.”
Greta was still standing next to Ryan. She said to the scruffy man, “Who’s Brendon?”
The guy looked at her and gave her a smile as he said, “I know you’ve seen him. He’s the guy you keep calling ‘that little Mormon sweetheart.’”
Ryan laughed inwardly. Mormon.
The woman’s eyes lit up and she pressed her fingertips to her forehead. “Oh! God, I feel like a jerk now. I see him passing through all the time and I say hello to him but I never knew his name!”
“You fail as a human being, Greta,” the man said, dead-faced.
Greta laughed in an adorably pleasant way that made tension bleed out of Ryan’s shoulders. She was about to respond, but another customer walked in the automatic doors, claiming Greta’s attention. She was quick to receive them, leaving Ryan with this random guy-his only real connection to Brendon.
Ryan scratched the back of his neck and said, “So, is he working?”
The man shook his head. “No. Even if he was, he’s mostly does Agent assignments outside of the center, so he isn’t here very long anyway.”
Ryan sighed. Mission failed.
To Ryan’s surprise, the man stuck out his hand and said, “I’m Jon. I unload the trucks with all the new stock for the store.”
Ryan smiled, a bit relieved that they finally had some sort of introduction. “I’m Ryan.”
“Sorry for just butting in there, but Brendon is one of my buddies.”
“Really?” Ryan said, trying not to sound excited.
“Yeah. Since the truck orders come in through the garage entrance, we see each other a lot when he’s in between jobs and I’m unloading deliveries,” Jon explained. “Why are you looking for Brendon?”
“I, uh, well,” Ryan began, completely unsure of where he was going to go with this. His only objective was to find Brendon, and he hadn’t thought much past that. What’s worse, he hadn’t even actually reached that part and he was already fumbling. “He, I guess, helped me with my computer and stuff a couple of days ago, and uh, I still had some questions about it. Just so, you know, I can keep from fucking it up again.”
Jon gave him an amused smirk, clearly enjoying Ryan’s squirming, and said, “He has another assignment day after tomorrow at 10 AM. He’ll be in here at about 9:15 to get a car, so you can try to catch him then, if you want.”
Ryan kept his smile subdued and replied with, “Thanks. I just might.”
He said goodbye to Jon, ignoring the odd calculating look that Jon kept giving him, and sauntered out of the center with a bit of a spring in his step.
Day after tomorrow at 9:15-he would be there.
* * *
The day after tomorrow came, and Ryan woke up at the sound of his alarm dinging. He smacked the alarm clock next to his bed and rubbed his eyes. He took a moment to fight with himself about whether he really wanted to get up or not, and then something set in that he hadn’t realized.
“Wait,” he thought, barely awake. The sound he had just heard was a little strange and didn’t feel like it fit, exactly.
He looked over at his clock and read the time: 11:47 AM.
Everything in the room seemed to freeze for a moment as it set in-his alarm hadn’t woken him up. He had overslept again. And this time, it wasn’t work he had missed, which, granted, was bad to miss, but work came almost every day. Brendon didn’t.
He felt his lungs constricting, and it was like he was back in high school, oversleeping and then rushing to get to the campus before he missed the whole day. He ripped the covers off and he lunged for his closet, hoping to find more than one or two articles of clean clothing. But he stopped amidst his frenzy when he realized it was pointless, there was no way Brendon would be there. He banged his head against the frame of his closet and swore at himself. He later hoped that a bruise wouldn’t show up in the middle of his forehead. No need to have one more thing to be angry at.
“What the hell woke me up?” he wondered, frustrated and a little despondent.
He didn’t wear a watch, so it hadn’t been that. He looked around the room quickly until his eyes landed on his sidekick sitting innocently on his computer desk. He stomped over and picked it up, flipping it open to find out that Spencer had texted him to see if Ryan wanted to come see the new Jet Li movie with him.
His fucking sidekick had awoken him. He had the strong urge to hurl it at the wall, but he put it down before he did something stupid. Instead, he went over to his alarm clock and checked his alarm setting to make sure he had set it up right. Sure enough, the alarm was set for 8:30, and he had definitely turned it on before falling asleep.
Then, Ryan realized the problem: he had set it for 8:30 PM instead of AM. He had that familiar itch to pick it up and throw it, too. Ryan never remembered sucking so bad with electronics before.
He went back and sat on his bed with his arms crossed indignantly, grumbling and swearing a little more, some at himself and some at everything else in the world. Because the whole fucking world was against him in this, he knew it.
He glared at his alarm clock first, cursing its complete ineffectiveness, and then he glared over at his sidekick. After a second or two of seething, he growled and got up to retrieve it. He made sure to be particularly vicious when punching the keys.
what time n where?
* * *
“The deal has always been that I buy the tickets and you buy the snacks, Ry. Check way back in our movie-going history and you’ll remember,” said Spencer, sipping on his Coke as they walked into the movie theater.
“I think we need to change things up then, since I always end up paying, like, twice the amount of the tickets just sustaining you with movie theater popcorn and candy,” Ryan groused.
“Hey, just because you couldn’t manage to haul your lazy ass out of bed this morning doesn’t mean you can start being a dick. It’s a movie, dude. Let’s have fun.”
Ryan sighed. “I know, sorry. I just feel like I missed a really good opportunity today that I may never get again. That is, unless I resort to stalking him or something.”
“Yeah, because you’re totally not bordering on that anyway. But let’s say you actually had caught him this morning-what would you have done next?” asked Spencer, giving Ryan a pointed look as they ascended the stairs to find seats.
“Well,” Ryan began, already stalling, “… I would have probably… said something like… god, I have no idea.”
“You see? You don’t even have the slightest idea as to what you’re doing. At least have some sort of plan of action. Or hey, did you ever think of letting this guy come to you? That might be the smarter thing to do so you don’t end up expending so much energy only to find out that he won’t do the same. Maybe he’s not interested in you like that.”
“What if I’m not interested like ‘that’?” Ryan said as they began shuffling towards the center of an empty row.
Spencer sat down and put his Coke in the cup-holder before saying, “As much as I already think I know the answer to this question, then what do you even want with him, anyway?”
Ryan furrowed his eyebrows and frowned, thinking hard. What did he want with Brendon? He hadn’t really thought about it much.
“I… I don’t know yet, ok?” he answered a little sorely.
“That’s what I thought,” was Spencer reply.
“Maybe I want to find out what kind of person he is,” Ryan offered. “Maybe I think he’s interesting.”
“Yeah, you told me that before, but interesting in what way? In a friend way or a… lover way?” Spencer said, using the word delicately.
“I don’t know!” Ryan shot back. “Neither way. It’s just that… I can’t stop thinking about him, wanting to talk to him. He seems like he would have so much to say when he’s not trying to remember computer codes or get out of your hair as soon as possible.”
“Did you ever think that maybe he doesn’t want to get to know you back?” Spencer said carefully. His eyebrows rose like Mrs. Smith’s used to do when she was being sympathetic.
Ryan considered telling him what Brendon had said about requesting to take the job helping Ryan again, but he was pretty sure Spencer could easily poke a hole in it. Instead, he went in another direction.
“He seems like the type to be too shy to say anything. Even if he was slightly interested in hanging out, I don’t know if I’d be able to tell, which is why I’m just going to keep trying and hope for the best,” Ryan explained, feeling strangely optimistic once he finished.
“As long as you’re sure,” Spencer said, getting comfortable in his seat as the theater dimmed.
Ryan wasn’t sure at all, but that didn’t change his mind.
* * *
Part 2
Pairing: Ryan/Brendon
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 21,800
Disclaimer: Not real, not mine. Also, about 80% of the Geek Squad info is fictitious. I have no idea how the company operates or what Geek Squad is even like, only that they wear dorky uniforms and fiddle around with electronics. The title belongs to the Revenge of the Nerds movie series.
Notes: The basic idea belongs to hellodolly123. I wrote a piece of this as a belated birthday gift to her and got wrapped up in the idea so much that I had to keep going. Thus, I have this ridiculous AU. *facepalm*
Summary: "Sorry, man. Maybe you should call Geek Squad."
It all started with a stupid email from Spencer. The subject line of the email said, "You have to check this out!” It sounded enough like Spencer. When he opened it, the only thing it contained was a link and a smiley face. Nothing telling what it was or why Ryan needed to see it. It was probably some ridiculous site or video. Spencer liked to frequent weird but strangely hilarious sites, so Ryan clicked the link.
A new window popped up and loaded quickly. It was a porn site.
"Okaaay," Ryan said aloud. Spencer never sent him porn, and Ryan wasn't even sure Spencer looked at porn. It was sort of confusing, even suspicious.
He took a quick look at the page (because, hey, he was already there) and it looked like a big collection of amateur porn clips. He was going to have to call Spencer later to tell him how grossed out he was that his best friend was sending him porn, and how if he was going to be a pervert, he could at least find better sites. Bored of the site already, Ryan moved the mouse to exit the window, but when he clicked little X at the top corner, a new little window popped up. And another. And then another, until his entire screen was covered in tiny little pop-up windows. Little advertisements flashed on the screen ranging from rip-off Rolexes to ads for more porn sites. Ryan started getting a little panicky and began closing pages as quickly as possible, but they kept coming up too fast for him to keep up with. Some came with sounds from car horns beeping (You've just been entered to win a V8!) to moaning from more goddamn cheap porn. Then all of a sudden, his computer screen froze. Ryan was still trying to fight each little pop-up and it took him a second to realize that his mouse wasn't moving.
After a few moments of staring at his screen and wiggling the mouse insistently, Ryan actually screamed.
* * *
"Dude! What the fuck have you done to my computer?!" Ryan yelled into the phone when Spencer picked up.
"What the hell are you talking about, Ryan? This is Ryan, isn't it?" Spencer said, very confused on the other end of the line.
"That fucking site you sent me crashed my damn computer!" screeched Ryan.
"Oh, man, didn't I call you and tell you? My email got hacked and it sent weird sites to my whole list of contacts. I thought I called you and left a message."
Ryan rolled his eyes and pulled his cell phone away from his ear. Sure enough, there at the top of the screen was a little icon shaped like an envelope, alerting Ryan that he had a new voicemail in his box. Ryan's jaw dropped.
"No fucking way," he said, more to himself than Spencer.
Spencer still answered. "Sorry, man. Maybe you should call Geek Squad or something."
"Yeah," Ryan said, a little shaken and still in half-disbelief. His computer had just crashed, but it was so heavy on him that it felt like his dog had just died. He didn't know how to process it yet. "Maybe I will call them."
* * *
Ryan really had no idea how computers worked aside from how to get around on one. It didn't even occur to him that the Geek Squad might not have even been the right people to call until after he had called in and scheduled an appointment with an Agent.
The woman on the phone had been nice, listening to Ryan explain the trouble and then trying to suggest solutions. However, Ryan just started getting frustrated because it wasn't like he really knew the technical lingo and nothing was making sense to him. He didn't know how to explain the problem with his computer. All he knew is that he went to a site, his computer froze, and it wouldn't load when he tried to boot it back up.
Patient as ever, the woman suggested that Ryan either come into one of the Best Buy locations and get technical help from the Geek Squad there or hire an Agent, as they called them, to come and take a look at the computer and figure out how to fix the problem that way. So relieved, Ryan immediately agreed to hire the Agent and gave his address. The woman told him that his Agent would come to his house in three days at noon to help him with his computer difficulties. She politely bid him good day and ended the call.
Three days passed and Ryan was sitting in his bedroom in front of his computer, wondering if there was any hope of saving the thing or if he should just borrow Spencer’s computer and start looking at the new laptops online. He was absent-mindedly tidying his room up (because he didn't want to look like a complete slob) when the doorbell rang and got Ryan's attention.
He went to the door and looked quickly through the peephole. On the other side, there stood a man with a short-sleeved, white shirt tucked into black slacks and a black tie. Out on the side of the road, Ryan could see the signature Geek Squad car parked.
"Are they serious?" Ryan thought as he stepped back to open the door.
Oh yes, they were serious. There was the Agent with red-rimmed glasses on his nose and a briefcase in hand. The sad part was that the guy wasn't some fat, balding, middle-aged man or a stick-skinny, ugly thing with nothing going for him but his computer knowledge. He looked so young and fresh. Ryan wondered why he got a job working for the Geek Squad. Sure, he was sort of thin and pale with glasses, but that didn't automatically make someone a loser. However, the job with the Geek Squad was edging him in that direction, as was his awful haircut.
"Hello," the man said in a sort of practiced tone. "My name's Brendon Urie and I'm your Geek Squad Agent."
"Hey, I'm Ryan. Come on in and take a look at this thing," said Ryan, waving vaguely behind him. He moved to the side and let Brendon in before closing the door behind him. Brendon took a quick look at the room but didn't seem to care enough to dwell very long, so he waited for Ryan to lead him to the computer.
"This way," said Ryan, motioning for Brendon to follow him. "It's in the bedroom."
Brendon skittered behind him to his bedroom and sat down at Ryan's computer chair before Ryan even had a chance to try and describe the issue at hand.
"It won't start up. A few days ago, it froze while I was surfing the internet," Ryan said, plainly lying. As much as Ryan was sure there were more embarrassing ways to crash a computer, a dignified part of him wouldn't just admit that I was at a pornography site and the pop-ups ate my computer. Brendon didn't need to know. Brendon probably didn't even care to know how it happened, anyway. His job was to fix it now that it had happened. The how was really only relevant to Ryan, who swore to himself that he would never click on a link in an email ever again no matter how safe it looked.
Brendon hadn't said anything since his short little introduction but was already getting to work at pressing buttons and poking around the computer tower. It was sort of awkward and maybe a little rude, in Ryan's opinion, that Brendon didn't at least tell him theories on what could fix this. Normal computer repair guys sat there and tried to educate Ryan, telling him all he never cared to know about his RAM or how many giga-whatevers a decent computer should have.
Actually, reconsidering it, Ryan realized that maybe Brendon was the more polite of the two types. Still, his silence was a little unnerving.
"So, do you think you can fix it or is this one of those Blue Screen of Death things where I should just abandon hope now?" Ryan asked, hoping to at least get Brendon to laugh a little. Brendon did crack a smile, but he bent his head like he was hiding it and just kept working. It was sort of endearing. Maybe, Ryan reasoned, the guy was just shy. He wasn't being rude; he just didn't know what to say.
"You seem pretty young to be on the Geek Squad," Ryan said, trying to sound conversational. He was hoping this wouldn't be a big, awkward affair but Brendon was not helping turn things around.
"I'm twenty," Brendon finally said.
"Success!" Ryan silently rejoiced. Then he joked, "I thought all the Geek Squad had were thirty year old men without girlfriends."
Brendon visibly bristled at that and Ryan felt a stab of regret and embarrassment. Brendon just said, "Not everyone thinks a girlfriend is top priority."
"Oh, well, yeah, there are more... important things than just, uh... than just girls," stumbled Ryan. Awesome. He had already established himself as an asshole. "I'm just gonna..." He jabbed a thumb over his shoulder and backed out of the room slowly. Brendon didn't look up as he left, a little flustered with his face tinged pink.
Once safely out of the room and away from Brendon, Ryan sighed and rubbed his eyes. He was such an idiot. He wondered, though, why he was so set on making a good impression. It wasn't like Ryan was ever going to see this guy once his computer was back up and running. And he had tried to be friendly but Brendon had hardly responded. If Brendon wanted to work in peace, then fine. Ryan wasn't going to sit around and try to coax conversation out of him. He had better things to do.
However, most of these things would have taken place in his bedroom where all his shit was. So maybe he would have to find something less-important-but-still-better to do, which turned out to be flipping the TV on and seeing what he could watch. He settled on The Last Samurai, content to watch Tom Cruise in all his weirdness strutting around the screen.
He got all the way through the movie and Brendon still hadn't come out to even tell Ryan how things were going. Ryan started getting a little worried. Was something wrong? Was Ryan's computer that fucked? Had Brendon stolen the computer and escaped out the window?
Curious, Ryan got up and tiptoed to the bedroom, the door still open wide. He leaned in the doorway with both hands on the frame to see Brendon bent over the tower with his ass sticking out, poking around some more like he was trying to take the whole damn thing apart.
"Any progress?" Ryan said from the doorway, causing Brendon to jump and look up. He had a scared, confused sort of look on his face that just didn't make sense to Ryan (unless he really was planning on snatching his computer when Ryan wasn't looking).
Brendon made something close to a smile and said, "Just going through the different methods."
Ryan nodded and ahhed like he knew what those were. Brendon went back to stretching over the computer and looking like he was trying to stick his head in the tower. Ryan just tried not to laugh and thought to himself that this guy didn't look like he had a clue as to what he was doing. And the two hours or so Brendon had already spent checking this thing out seemed to say that, at the very least, Brendon wasn't their star employee. He couldn't fix your computer in some weird, timed competition. Ryan wondered if really big computer nerds had those or if that was only for solving Rubik's cubes.
Ryan left Brendon alone again.
He went to the kitchen and made himself a sandwich, eating slowly before slumping back down on the couch and watching two episodes of So You Think You Can Dance re-runs. Finally, Ryan got back up and stalked to his room to see Brendon staring at a screen of numbers and text, which probably meant something in Geek-speak but only looked like The Matrix to Ryan.
"Anything yet?" Ryan said impatiently. The guy had been at his house for hours. He hoped Brendon wasn't charging an hourly rate. Ryan was going to be really pissed if the guy was just wasting his time to get paid more.
"I got it booted up and running. I think you had a pretty nasty virus," Brendon said, eyes still glued to the screen. "You should probably install a virus-protection program after this to keep it from happening again in the future."
"Yeah, thanks," Ryan said, sounding a little like a smart-ass. Brendon's fingers on the keys faltered for just a second, like that little remark got to him, but then continued on like it didn't happen.
Ryan crossed his arms, not feeling sorry yet for being a jerk (because, seriously, the guy had been here for way too long), and said, "How much longer do you think this will take?"
"Not much longer. The hardest part was finding the virus and purging it. Now I'm just doing some last minute cleaning up to make sure there aren't any more little viruses eating away at your computer. Maybe ten more minutes and then I'll be out of your hair." The way Brendon said it made him sound like a dog with its tail between its legs, like he knew he was being a nuisance and he wanted to leave so Ryan wouldn't pick at him anymore.
"Ten minutes. Ok. I'll wait," Ryan thought, sitting himself down on the edge of his bed. He watched Brendon go through codes and files, his fingers flying across the keyboard without even a glance downward. Brendon may not have been their champion Agent, but he still knew a thing or two about how to handle computers.
The light from the screen reflected softly off of Brendon's glasses, giving him a sort of glazed look as he went through and scanned the computer for more possible viruses. The screen looked like a wall of jumbled letters and numbers, falling from the top of the screen to the bottom in blocks of paragraphs. Suddenly, the screen stopped moving and Brendon kept typing.
"Well, I think I figured out what caused the virus," he said, and Ryan's breath seized in his throat.
"Shit shit shit," thought Ryan, fear seizing him.
Brendon squinted at the computer where a URL was written out. "...Big-Ass Titties?" He looked back at Ryan with the smuggest smirk Ryan had ever seen. Ryan could only imagine the look of horror on his own face.
"My friend's email got hacked. I got a link in an email and I ended up there. I didn't even know what it was," Ryan explained, his eyes a little wider than normal. "It was an accident."
Brendon didn't say a word, but the look on his face said it all. He felt like he had caught Ryan in something. There was a gleam behind his glasses that made him look like he was grinning on the inside like Ryan was the loser here. Never mind that Brendon was wearing that dorky short-sleeved button down shirt and driving a car proclaiming his loserdom. No, Ryan was the dork looking at porn sites and getting viruses like some creep who loaded himself up with spyware from lurking around shady sites. If Ryan had been the bullying type, he would have made a stab at Brendon about how he probably only had porn to keep him company most nights and he shouldn't be making fun. Later, Ryan wondered if saying it would have even scathed Brendon at all.
It was like, all of a sudden, Brendon had this newfound sense of confidence that he had something over Ryan's head that made Ryan look more like an idiot than Brendon in his tie. Brendon seemed to have resigned himself to being a geek until this. It was like this made them equals in Brendon's head.
He relaxed a little in his chair as if he was much less concerned about seeming professional now, and he looked back at Ryan with those smiling eyes. They mocked him and searched him at the same time, making Ryan feel embarrassed and almost violated. There was something else behind those bright red frames that made Ryan's skin crawl. This look that Brendon was giving him mixed in so well with the superior stare that Ryan almost didn't notice it. It was almost... teasingly seductive, like he was silently saying, "You dirty boy, what were you doing there?" When Brendon gave him a half-smile and arched an eyebrow, both of Ryan's eyebrows shot up in defense.
Where did this guy get this? From where was he drawing this sudden burst of confidence? When he had walked in, he had barely said a word and only looked Ryan in the face long enough to say his own name. How on earth did this pale little Geek Squad Agent turn into this? It didn't make sense and it was fascinating. Clearly, Brendon was not just some shy, nerdy little tech support guy. The guy had a different personality, had a hidden story behind his square glasses and stupid uniform. And Ryan, being the analytical type of guy that he was, was curious to figure him out.
Ryan's mind suddenly got a flash of Brendon bent over the computer tower before, ass high and obvious.
Oh, Ryan was so hooked.
"Alright, well," Brendon said, stretching his arms over his head and fixing his tie, "I've got your computer back up and working. Like I said before, you'll probably want to install some more firewalls and virus scanners to make sure this isn't a normal thing that happens to your computer. Our website has a few places you can go to and download them for free. It really saves you a lot of headaches, especially if you're a regular at sites like Big-Ass Titties." He looked like he was trying really hard not to laugh. Ryan winced.
Then Brendon said, "The bill will come in the mail. If you need anything or have any questions, our helpline number is posted on our website. Free feel to call if you have any more problems or concerns. My work, however, is done."
"Uh, thanks," Ryan managed to say as Brendon packed up his briefcase.
"No problem. Glad to be of service, Ryan," Brendon said, subtly accenting Ryan's name. It was like he was silently saying, "I'll remember you."
Ryan saw Brendon to the door and peeked out of the front window to watch Brendon walk back to the car with a different step than he arrived with and then drive away.
* * *
Ryan went to the Geek Squad website just hours after Brendon left and installed those virus-protection programs. While there, Ryan strayed to the Agent section of the site, seeing what they were supposed to be capable of doing for him.
He had to think of a reason for Brendon to come back. He was already going crazy with curiosity about him and the idea of just forgetting about him seemed absurd. Then the perfect solution came to him.
- Contain virus outbreaks
- Remove prying spyware
- Install virus-and spyware-protection software
- Show you how to use your digital camera.
It couldn't have been more perfect. Spencer had just gotten a new digital camera the other week and it was the coolest shit Ryan had seen since the Wii. No doubt it was complicated, with lots of confusing buttons and weird settings. All he would have to do is borrow it and call for Brendon to come and help him figure it out. And since Spencer was indirectly responsible for his computer crashing in the first place, it would be the least he could do to try and make it up to Ryan.
Brilliance only came easily to a true genius, and Ryan fancied himself a real genius at that moment.
He did not, however, fancy himself one when he was sitting on the phone with another representative and was going to ask for Brendon specifically but, for the life of him, could not remember Brendon's last name. Brendon had said it maybe once, but Ryan hadn’t really been paying attention. He told representative-a man, this time-that the last Agent whom he'd last hired was very helpful and friendly, but he only remembered that his first name was Brendon and he wore red glasses.
"I'm sorry, sir, but the representatives don't work with the Agents. They're in a completely different sect of the company, so I can't help you with who you might have hired before. Rest assured, though, that all of our Agents are very capable, friendly workers who can help you learn about your new digital camera."
Ryan wanted to growl and say, "I don't want another Agent, I want Brendon." The man was starting to get on Ryan's nerves with his detached, business-like attitude. Ryan was sure that the woman he talked to before would have at least been sympathetic and jotted down a note to send along for the right person to read.
Despite his frustration, Ryan thanked the man and gave his address again, hoping against hope that things would work out and Brendon would be the one to show up at his house.
* * *
The man on the phone had told Ryan that the Agent would come to his house the next day at about four in the afternoon. So Ryan waited anxiously at the front window, watching for the car to pull up in front of his house. His hands were a little shaky and his heart was thudding in his chest with practically no rhythm. When the car finally did drive up to his house, Ryan felt like everything around him stopped. Everything was deathly still as he waited to see who emerged from the little black and white car.
It was hard to tell, at first, because of the distance, but the dark mop of hair on top of the faceless Agent's head was a good sign. As the figure came closer, Ryan saw the quickest flash of red across the Agent's face.
"There is a God!" Ryan hollered out loud with his arms thrown up in the air. His burst of joy was stifled as Brendon came closer to the door. Ryan busied himself with his nervous habit of smoothing down his hair and pulling on the hem of his t-shirt that did not want to touch the top of his pants. Then he waited for Brendon to knock.
The rhythmic tap tap tap of Brendon's knuckles echoed through the house and Ryan waited a few seconds to walk to the front door and open it casually.
"Well, hey," Ryan said with a bright smile. Brendon gave him back an indiscernible look, and it got Ryan's mind abuzz with questions already.
"Whoareyou? Howareyou? Whatareyouthinking? Whatdoyouthinkofme? What'syourlifelike? Letmeunderstandyou."
Brendon said, "They tell me you need the lowdown on your new camera." The tiny smirk growing from the corners of his mouth was playful.
Ryan chuckled a little, hoping Brendon was meaning to be funny, and waved for Brendon to come inside. They entered the living room where Spencer's new and expensive camera was waiting on the coffee table. Ryan picked it up and handed it to Brendon with an unsure, expectant look. Brendon took a quick look at it and turned it on while Ryan watched with crossed arms.
"Now, do you need to know something specific or do you just want the general run-through?" Brendon said in a small voice, like he was falling back into that nerdy façade, just getting his work done and getting out.
“Oh, um, I just need to know all the normal stuff. I don’t know how to do anything but turn it on and take a picture,” he said, feeling a little embarrassed that it was actually true.
“The most helpful thing you can always do is read the manual. That’s normally the fastest way to answer a question or fix a problem,” Brendon said as he pushed his glasses up his nose.
“Yeah, I, uh… lost my manual?” was all Ryan could think to say. He had forgotten to ask Spencer for it and he felt a little stupid now. It probably made him look even stupider to Brendon.
Brendon gave a slightly indulgent smile and turned the camera on as he sat down on the couch. He said, “We’ll start with how to use the playback setting.”
Ryan hesitantly sat down next to him, unsure of what a safe but friendly distance would be. The camera whizzed and whirred a little before making a happy ping and flashing a picture of Spencer and Haley across the screen.
“My best friend and his girlfriend,” Ryan explained. He couldn’t understand why he was feeling so awkward and anxious. If anything, that should have been Brendon. Granted, Brendon was still a little awkward anyway but Ryan thought it unfair that he felt it too.
“They’re a cute couple,” Brendon said with a small, sweet smile. It was the first real conversational thing Brendon had ever said to Ryan and it made Ryan want to grin. Progress! Ryan nodded and looked back at Haley and Spencer, sitting in Spencer’s car and taking pictures in the front seats.
“They’re really great for each other,” Ryan said with an approving nod.
“Any pictures on here you might not want someone else to see? Like, you and your girlfriend, for example?” Brendon said. He flashed another smile much like the one from the other day. A teasing, playful one with the tiniest show of teeth.
“Oh, no, no!” Ryan said. He quickly assured Brendon that he didn’t have a girlfriend anyway, and he wouldn’t be taking pictures like that if he did.
He could have sworn he heard Brendon mutter something that sounded like, “Hm. Interesting.”
Brendon continued on and showed Ryan all the functions and features of the camera, nearly boring Ryan to death because it wasn’t as if he was actually planning on using the damn thing. All the while, Ryan kept trying to initiate some sort of conversation but Brendon stayed on task and only answered in the most polite, brief way.
“Stupid idiot with your stupid good work ethic,” Ryan thought bitterly as Brendon was droning on about different flash settings. At the very least, Brendon was really knowledgeable about the camera, even to the point of half-confusing Ryan. He tried not to listen too closely lest his brain be scrambled.
It was almost an hour before Brendon was finished showing Ryan everything on the camera because he had to demonstrate half of the functions, so now Ryan had about thirty arbitrary pictures of his living room. There was, however, a little gem waiting on the camera for later-a picture Brendon took of himself to show how to focus on an object up close or far away. Ryan was glad that Brendon was flying too quickly through his instructions to delete any pictures.
“Well, that should cover just about everything,” Brendon said conclusively. “Do you have any questions?”
“About a hundred, and none to do with the damn camera,” thought Ryan. It came out as, “Nope, thanks for the help.”
Brendon gave a cordial smile and rose to leave. A panic alarm went off in Ryan’s head saying, “Don’t let him leave yet!” And as much as he tried to fight with it and argue that “there’s no valid reason for him to stay,” it still insisted that Ryan stop Brendon before he walked out that door.
After saying his courteous goodbye, Brendon headed for the front door. Feeling a bit conflicted for a moment, Ryan stretched out a hand for Brendon when he wasn’t looking and then let it shrink back to his chest. He jumped up from the couch and followed Brendon to the door. Once there, he fumbled for words until all that came out was, “What’s your name again?”
Brendon gave him one of those fake, dry smiles that a person uses when they’re a bit offended, and he said, “Brendon Urie.”
“Brendon Urie,” Ryan repeated in his head like he was mentally writing it down, tucking it away for future use. “Sorry, I just completely forgot it before and when I needed help with the camera, I couldn’t remember your name to ask for you but you came anyway so I guess that worked out and stuff… and… yeah.”
He felt his confidence drying up like a puddle in the desert. Rambling and hints at creepy work-stalking were just not going to help Ryan. But Brendon scratched the back of his head and grinned like a bashful little eight year old.
“I asked for the assignment,” he said quietly, like a confession. He glanced up at Ryan with his eyebrows drawn together a little, and Ryan felt his mouth splitting into a grin. Brendon had requested to work for him again.
Somehow, when Brendon was being nervous and jittery, Ryan felt himself calm down, like he didn’t need to impress Brendon or anything because now Brendon was the one trying to hold himself together.
“Well, I’m very glad for your help,” said Ryan, folding his arms casually.
Brendon looked Ryan right in the eyes for the longest he ever had and said with a quick nod, “Take care, Ryan.”
With that, he walked out the door and down the sidewalk where his Geek-mobile was parked. Ryan waved from his doorway and didn’t suppress the wide smile when Brendon waved back.
* * *
“You know what the most retarded part of this story is?” Spencer said, munching noisily on his chips. Ryan just grunted around his sub in response. Spencer gave a mocking smirk and said, “That you’re trying so hard to impress such a loser.”
Ryan was mildly affronted and his huff indicated so. “I’m not trying to impress him, and he’s… he’s not a loser, ok?”
“He works for the Geek Squad, Ryan,” Spencer said dryly.
“Which probably means he’s smart.” Ryan was getting defensive. “Who says you can’t be smart and interesting and cool?”
“This coming from the guy who used to pick up the hottest blonde girl in the room when William would take us to college parties.”
“Maybe I’ve realized that I need to grow out of that,” Ryan mumbled, like he wasn’t sure if he was ready to admit it yet.
“And as mature and great as that is-I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you want to grow out of it-that doesn’t explain the jump. How do you go from Jac Vanek and Keltie Colleen to the guy who fixed your computer? How do these connect?” Spencer said, waving his sub around emphatically.
Ryan sighed in exasperation and pulled Spencer’s camera out of his messenger bag. He turned it to playback and handed the camera to Spencer without a word. Spencer took it cautiously and looked at the screen. There was a picture of a guy with slightly mussed hair and vibrant eyes behind oddly stylish glasses. His smile was so warm and pleasant that Spencer almost caught himself smiling back.
“He’s… cute,” Spencer said. His tone was a mix of astonishment and discomfort. “If I was into dudes, I would probably be interested too.”
“Don’t think of it like that, dude. There’s more to him. Yeah, he’s sort of good-looking, but he has this weird air about him that I can’t describe.”
“A sexy air?” Spencer waggled his eyebrows and bit his lip.
Ryan gave a practically explosive laugh. “Hardly. He seems so introverted and awkward, at least from what I’ve seen so far. But he has these moments where it’s almost like his mask slips. I don’t doubt he actually is kind of a dork at the core, but I feel like he’s hiding another very different side of himself.”
“I would be surprised if you knew every side of him after seeing each other twice, though, dude,” said Spencer as he licked mustard off his fingers. “Of course there are sides to him you don’t know about.”
Ryan shook his head and his hair fell into his eyes. “I know that but it’s just… like I said, I can’t even describe it. But I have this feeling that he’s this really awesome guy underneath his geek façade.”
Spencer was quiet for a few seconds and then started snickering behind his lips. “Underneath it, huh?”
Ryan cuffed him on the arm and said, “Oh, shut up, dickwad!” He still laughed in spite of himself.
* * *
Ryan got the bills in the mail a few days later. When he opened them up and read the totals, he nearly stopped breathing. Because, oh yeah, he was paying Brendon to come to his house. That part had sort of slipped his mind.
He sat on his couch with the bills in hand and stared at them for a good five minutes before coming to the conclusion that hiring Brendon to make house calls was not going to be affordable much longer.
There had to be another way. He and Brendon were just starting to get somewhere and he couldn’t just forget about him now. The first thing he thought of was going down to Best Buy to see if Brendon worked there, too. It was probably a long shot, especially since the whole Geek company seemed to be pretty sectioned off from what he could tell, but Ryan didn’t have much of a choice if he wanted to see Brendon again and still have money afterwards.
It was worth a shot.
* * *
The doors whizzed open for him as he stepped up to the entrance of the giant building with the words Best Buy lit up out front in black and yellow.
“Oh god, I am such a loser for doing this,” Ryan mumbled to himself with a bit of a wince.
There were employees buzzing around, scuttling back and forth between departments and computers in skirts or ties. To Ryan’s surprise, it was a woman with blonde curls who came up and approached him. She wore a modest skirt that reached her knees and a nametag with the name Greta printed on it.
“Hello,” she said rather pleasantly. “Can I help you, sir?”
“Um, not right now, I just… want to, uh,” he floundered. “I was just wondering if Brendon Urie was working.”
“No, I don’t think we have a Brendon working today. In fact, I’m not sure I even know if a Brendon Urie works here at all. I’m sorry.”
Ryan told her it was ok, and she tried to continue. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”
At that moment, Ryan saw someone coming closer from his peripheral vision. When he glanced over, he saw a man just an inch or two shorter than himself with a thin, scratchy beard forming on his face. He didn’t look like he worked there and Ryan didn’t recognize him, but he looked straight at Ryan and said, “Brendon Urie? You’re looking for Brendon?”
Ryan nodded, wondering why this complete stranger was talking to him. He hoped this was actually going somewhere, because quite honestly, the guy vaguely looked like he had walked in from sleeping in the street.
The man smiled. “I know him. I see him every few days when he comes to pick up a Geek car.”
Greta was still standing next to Ryan. She said to the scruffy man, “Who’s Brendon?”
The guy looked at her and gave her a smile as he said, “I know you’ve seen him. He’s the guy you keep calling ‘that little Mormon sweetheart.’”
Ryan laughed inwardly. Mormon.
The woman’s eyes lit up and she pressed her fingertips to her forehead. “Oh! God, I feel like a jerk now. I see him passing through all the time and I say hello to him but I never knew his name!”
“You fail as a human being, Greta,” the man said, dead-faced.
Greta laughed in an adorably pleasant way that made tension bleed out of Ryan’s shoulders. She was about to respond, but another customer walked in the automatic doors, claiming Greta’s attention. She was quick to receive them, leaving Ryan with this random guy-his only real connection to Brendon.
Ryan scratched the back of his neck and said, “So, is he working?”
The man shook his head. “No. Even if he was, he’s mostly does Agent assignments outside of the center, so he isn’t here very long anyway.”
Ryan sighed. Mission failed.
To Ryan’s surprise, the man stuck out his hand and said, “I’m Jon. I unload the trucks with all the new stock for the store.”
Ryan smiled, a bit relieved that they finally had some sort of introduction. “I’m Ryan.”
“Sorry for just butting in there, but Brendon is one of my buddies.”
“Really?” Ryan said, trying not to sound excited.
“Yeah. Since the truck orders come in through the garage entrance, we see each other a lot when he’s in between jobs and I’m unloading deliveries,” Jon explained. “Why are you looking for Brendon?”
“I, uh, well,” Ryan began, completely unsure of where he was going to go with this. His only objective was to find Brendon, and he hadn’t thought much past that. What’s worse, he hadn’t even actually reached that part and he was already fumbling. “He, I guess, helped me with my computer and stuff a couple of days ago, and uh, I still had some questions about it. Just so, you know, I can keep from fucking it up again.”
Jon gave him an amused smirk, clearly enjoying Ryan’s squirming, and said, “He has another assignment day after tomorrow at 10 AM. He’ll be in here at about 9:15 to get a car, so you can try to catch him then, if you want.”
Ryan kept his smile subdued and replied with, “Thanks. I just might.”
He said goodbye to Jon, ignoring the odd calculating look that Jon kept giving him, and sauntered out of the center with a bit of a spring in his step.
Day after tomorrow at 9:15-he would be there.
* * *
The day after tomorrow came, and Ryan woke up at the sound of his alarm dinging. He smacked the alarm clock next to his bed and rubbed his eyes. He took a moment to fight with himself about whether he really wanted to get up or not, and then something set in that he hadn’t realized.
“Wait,” he thought, barely awake. The sound he had just heard was a little strange and didn’t feel like it fit, exactly.
He looked over at his clock and read the time: 11:47 AM.
Everything in the room seemed to freeze for a moment as it set in-his alarm hadn’t woken him up. He had overslept again. And this time, it wasn’t work he had missed, which, granted, was bad to miss, but work came almost every day. Brendon didn’t.
He felt his lungs constricting, and it was like he was back in high school, oversleeping and then rushing to get to the campus before he missed the whole day. He ripped the covers off and he lunged for his closet, hoping to find more than one or two articles of clean clothing. But he stopped amidst his frenzy when he realized it was pointless, there was no way Brendon would be there. He banged his head against the frame of his closet and swore at himself. He later hoped that a bruise wouldn’t show up in the middle of his forehead. No need to have one more thing to be angry at.
“What the hell woke me up?” he wondered, frustrated and a little despondent.
He didn’t wear a watch, so it hadn’t been that. He looked around the room quickly until his eyes landed on his sidekick sitting innocently on his computer desk. He stomped over and picked it up, flipping it open to find out that Spencer had texted him to see if Ryan wanted to come see the new Jet Li movie with him.
His fucking sidekick had awoken him. He had the strong urge to hurl it at the wall, but he put it down before he did something stupid. Instead, he went over to his alarm clock and checked his alarm setting to make sure he had set it up right. Sure enough, the alarm was set for 8:30, and he had definitely turned it on before falling asleep.
Then, Ryan realized the problem: he had set it for 8:30 PM instead of AM. He had that familiar itch to pick it up and throw it, too. Ryan never remembered sucking so bad with electronics before.
He went back and sat on his bed with his arms crossed indignantly, grumbling and swearing a little more, some at himself and some at everything else in the world. Because the whole fucking world was against him in this, he knew it.
He glared at his alarm clock first, cursing its complete ineffectiveness, and then he glared over at his sidekick. After a second or two of seething, he growled and got up to retrieve it. He made sure to be particularly vicious when punching the keys.
what time n where?
* * *
“The deal has always been that I buy the tickets and you buy the snacks, Ry. Check way back in our movie-going history and you’ll remember,” said Spencer, sipping on his Coke as they walked into the movie theater.
“I think we need to change things up then, since I always end up paying, like, twice the amount of the tickets just sustaining you with movie theater popcorn and candy,” Ryan groused.
“Hey, just because you couldn’t manage to haul your lazy ass out of bed this morning doesn’t mean you can start being a dick. It’s a movie, dude. Let’s have fun.”
Ryan sighed. “I know, sorry. I just feel like I missed a really good opportunity today that I may never get again. That is, unless I resort to stalking him or something.”
“Yeah, because you’re totally not bordering on that anyway. But let’s say you actually had caught him this morning-what would you have done next?” asked Spencer, giving Ryan a pointed look as they ascended the stairs to find seats.
“Well,” Ryan began, already stalling, “… I would have probably… said something like… god, I have no idea.”
“You see? You don’t even have the slightest idea as to what you’re doing. At least have some sort of plan of action. Or hey, did you ever think of letting this guy come to you? That might be the smarter thing to do so you don’t end up expending so much energy only to find out that he won’t do the same. Maybe he’s not interested in you like that.”
“What if I’m not interested like ‘that’?” Ryan said as they began shuffling towards the center of an empty row.
Spencer sat down and put his Coke in the cup-holder before saying, “As much as I already think I know the answer to this question, then what do you even want with him, anyway?”
Ryan furrowed his eyebrows and frowned, thinking hard. What did he want with Brendon? He hadn’t really thought about it much.
“I… I don’t know yet, ok?” he answered a little sorely.
“That’s what I thought,” was Spencer reply.
“Maybe I want to find out what kind of person he is,” Ryan offered. “Maybe I think he’s interesting.”
“Yeah, you told me that before, but interesting in what way? In a friend way or a… lover way?” Spencer said, using the word delicately.
“I don’t know!” Ryan shot back. “Neither way. It’s just that… I can’t stop thinking about him, wanting to talk to him. He seems like he would have so much to say when he’s not trying to remember computer codes or get out of your hair as soon as possible.”
“Did you ever think that maybe he doesn’t want to get to know you back?” Spencer said carefully. His eyebrows rose like Mrs. Smith’s used to do when she was being sympathetic.
Ryan considered telling him what Brendon had said about requesting to take the job helping Ryan again, but he was pretty sure Spencer could easily poke a hole in it. Instead, he went in another direction.
“He seems like the type to be too shy to say anything. Even if he was slightly interested in hanging out, I don’t know if I’d be able to tell, which is why I’m just going to keep trying and hope for the best,” Ryan explained, feeling strangely optimistic once he finished.
“As long as you’re sure,” Spencer said, getting comfortable in his seat as the theater dimmed.
Ryan wasn’t sure at all, but that didn’t change his mind.
* * *
Part 2