He almost dreads going to the office. He wakes up in the morning, gets dressed, and stares at himself in the mirror. He looks much the same as he did in college, other than a new haircut and a tiny scar on his chin where he cut himself too deeply with a razor. He has the same black curls, the same blue eyes, and the same perpetual stubble. A Spanish face, much like his mother’s. Olive-skinned and prone to tanning.
Still, he’s no movie star. Not in the way Leo is. Stop thinking about him. He sighs and tugs a hand through his hair, trying to distract himself with music as he climbs into his car. He seems to arrive at the office too quickly, still unfocused by the time he walks through the back door. His new key fits in easily and he walks in, greeted by cool air conditioning and the quiet bustle of people getting settled.
“Hey. We’re going to be meeting in team rooms from now on,” Rowan says, greeting him by the door and leading the way towards their new space. The man pulls open a glass door, balancing a laptop and cup of coffee while trying to keep the door open with his foot.
“Thanks,” Austin says quickly, ducking inside with his messenger bag and personal laptop.
It’s almost a conference room. There’s a board at the far end, cork and dry erase, concept art already papered around the edges. There are already people at work—a few artists with headphones, another animator Austin isn’t familiar with, a few scriptwriters. There are computer banks along the walls and a table in the center with plenty of room.
“Morning,” Dean says. Austin almost has a heart attack. I didn’t even hear him come in.
“Good morning,” he says, quickly taking a seat at a computer. He hopes he’s not too late to be early. It’s still technically five minutes before his shift; he likes showing initiative by settling in ahead of time.
“I have project files for everyone,” Dean says, waving a stack of folders, “so take the one with your name. Don’t forget to take breaks—we want hard work, not sloppy work. Oh—and some of the VAs will be coming through today. They’re doing a couple of recordings.”
“They’re all hired already?” Rowan asks, surprised. “That was fast. Guess Erin knew who she wanted.”
“Yup. Some pretty good ones, too. I think it’ll go well.”
Austin tries to ignore the gnawing dread in his stomach, choosing instead to concentrate on working. He finds his folder quickly, thumbing through the papers inside. Easy stuff, he thinks, logging onto the computer. He’s really just doing grunt work for the project. The others have more direction—they’ll be working on characters and major scenes. He’s relegated to doing small tasks and simple things. It’ll be easy for him to lose himself in the repetition.
Sure enough, time seems to fly by as he settles into a routine. He considers bringing in headphones or earbuds at one point, thinking it might help his productivity. He’s an hour and a half into working when the door opens. He doesn’t look up, sure it’s Dean or another team member.
“Impressive,” a voice says, smooth and rich at his ear. He jerks, mouse smacking the edge of the computer tower. Leo.
He tries to glare over his shoulder, heart beating erratically against his will. He doesn’t want to feel excitement or nervousness but they flood his system anyway, making speech nearly impossible. He takes a moment to think, drawing up words and trying to string them together in a coherent sentence.
“Do you mind?” Smooth, he berates himself. He doesn’t sound nearly as commanding or disinterested as he’d meant to.
“Sorry. Just appreciating your work,” Leo smiles.
The same smile. Leo is frustratingly handsome—not unattainable but definitely more handsome than average. It’s not even his beauty that makes him desirable, though—it’s the way he looks at you; his voice, and of course he’s a voice actor now; the way all of his attention is focused on the person he’s talking to, gaze steady and body leaning closer, as if what you have to say is the most important thing in the world.
He makes people feel important. Interesting. Desired. Austin’s never been sure whether it’s intentional or not, but he still hates it anyway. It’s one of the biggest reasons Leo’s betrayal had hurt so much. Austin had been wandering along, thinking he was the most important person in Leo’s world, and then he had cheated. His mouth flattens, and he leans away.
“I think Rowan’s working on a character. You might find that more interesting than trees,” Austin says curtly, fighting the desire to talk.
He really wants to ask what Leo’s been doing. Why he’s still in the same city, just like Austin. If he ever left, or if he’s always been there, just one coincidence away. Don’t, he tells himself. He’s not an idiot. He knows all too well how easy it is to let someone back in, expecting a change and getting disappointment instead.
He’s not some teenager, dewy-eyed and transfixed by a pretty face. He’s not going to cheapen himself by taking back a cheater. That’s what he tells himself.
“Trees are interesting,” Leo smiles, eyes sparkling with humor, “so many leaves. So many branches.”
“So eloquent,” Austin barks back, forgetting for a moment to reign himself in. He feels stupid. As if all his professionalism has flown out the window, along with his inhibitions.
He would be lying if he said he wasn’t enjoying the way Leo is leaning on the back of his chair. The way his arm is close, cologne a light undertone of something woodsy and rich. Austin can barely concentrate on his work, almost forgetting what it is he’s doing. He’s just getting flashes of his past, aided by the same type of henley shirt Leo had worn throughout college and the familiar cologne.
Sitting beside each other in a class. Leo slinging an arm around his shoulders at a bar, easy and relaxed. Closeness and the belt loops on jeans getting torn when they’re pulled too hard during a particularly passionate evening. Leo offering to sew them back on, stitches uneven and too big, Austin laughing and threatening to tear them out to start over again.
I still have those stupid jeans, he realizes, resolving to burn them when he gets home.
“When you two are done, will you come look at this, Austin?” Rowan asks drily.
His ears burn, and he pretends to duck his head to read something in his folder, frustrated. I’m letting Leo get to me. Just what he’d tried to avoid. It seems that, despite his attempts to pretend he’s invulnerable and logical, Leo can still tap into his...biological cues.
“Be right there,” Austin says, flipping a page over and writing a small note to himself. Burn the jeans.
He goes over to Rowan, relieved when Leo doesn’t follow him. He hopes someone else will distract him, at least for a few minutes.
“What is it?”
“Needed a second pair of eyes on this loop. See anything?” Rowan asks, sipping from his coffee. He looks over Austin’s shoulder, serious, watching Leo chat with a group of concept artists.
“Mmm,” Austin murmurs, trying to concentrate on the animation. He can practically feel Leo’s presence burning behind him like a flame. He coughs. “Try adjusting the rate here. There’s a skip.”
“Lina said you knew him in college. He always been this way?” The question throws Austin off again. He rubs the wrinkle between his eyebrows, thinking maybe he’ll take a relaxing bath when he gets home.
“What way? Sucking all the attention out of the room?”
“That’s one way of putting it,” Rowan concedes, raising an eyebrow. Damn it, Austin thinks. Stay professional.
“He’s...fit to be an actor.”
“Well, as long as he doesn’t bug us too often. Or the rest of us, I mean. He can bug you all he wants.”
“I don’t want him to bother me,” Austin says lowly, watching Rowan adjust the animation. Rowan plays it through again and Austin nods, stepping away from the computer. “Perfect. Looks good.”
“Thanks. Good luck,” Rowan adds, smirking a little. Austin sighs, trying to keep his frustration at bay, and leaves.
He has to take a walk around the building to get his mind off Leo and escape his physical presence. He knows he’s still attracted to Leo; hell, he’d probably have jumped into bed with him if they’d met at a bar. Except they hadn’t, and Austin had been completely sober and clear-minded when they’d first seen each other again. Not that he’s acted sober—he’ll be the first to admit that Leo puts him off balance even in the most mundane of situations. There’s something there. Remnants of their past relationship, probably, and the fact that he knows that Leo knows what he likes.
It felt like a curse, knowing they could work and that’s what was killing him. The possibility that was there and lost.
You could take him back, a small voice in his mind says. He pushes it away. It’s not like he hadn’t considered it once or twice. Except when he and Leo had gotten together, Austin had already known about Leo’s reputation for being a playboy. For famously having dated half of his calculus class. There was no one on campus who didn’t know Leo through one friend or another—and Austin, foolishly, had thought he would be the last. The one who could make Leo stay.
Then he’d found out about Leo and Damian, someone he never thought he’d have to worry about. Damian was just a friend in a class—a guy notorious for being moody, the type to drag his feet in conversation, much less a relationship. Someone Austin knew by sight and name only. Damian was in Leo’s drawing class and they had met up, somehow, on a day after Austin had a small fight with Leo. Just a small argument, something he’d thought would clear up by the time they woke up, but apparently, it had been enough for Leo to think cheating would be fine.
Except it wasn’t. Austin had found out easily enough, and he’d been broken, heart shattered in a million and one pieces, barely able to believe that Leo could do something like that. That he would even consider it. They’d been together for longer than any of Leo’s previous relationships, had spent a holiday together, had even bought a stupid bookshelf together. Tiny things that had meant so much and Leo had forgotten about it all, using one small fight as an excuse to go out and screw someone else he didn’t even know that well.
I still have self-respect, Austin thinks grimly. No matter how attracted he is to Leo, he’s not going to put his heart on the line again. Not for someone who’s already proven himself unreliable and self-sabotaging at best. All I have to do is stay away from him. Except now, they technically work at the same place. So staying away is going to be much easier said than done.
***
HE’S GOING INSANE. Actually, certifiably insane.
He stirs his coffee for the thousandth time, the creamer already dissolved into the brown liquid. It’s as if he thinks he can will Leo out of the project room simply by stalling. Leo has been around the room since they started two hours ago, and he’s showing no signs of leaving.
It’s been five days. Five full work days since Leo showed up and he is still hanging around. Austin was grateful for his novelty the first two days; he had been occupied by some of the women in the office and even one of the other men. Still, the novelty had worn off and eventually, Leo had become just another body in the room. An attractive one, certainly, but no more distracting than the work at hand. And there was so much work.
“You doing okay?”
Austin almost jumps out of his skin, not realizing that he’d been zoning out. Dean is by his side, pulling a coffee cup out of the cupboard. Thank God. At least I have an excuse to stay here longer. He leans against the counter, trying to play it off. The last thing he wants is his boss thinking he’s not up to the job.
“Fine. Just—thinking about something. How was the meeting this morning?”
“Great,” Dean says, opening a small packet of sugar, “they’re impressed with how fast we’re working. I think the teams are doing fantastically this time around. The projects really fit the people.”
Right, Austin thinks, because my life is a horror game right now. He nods, taking a sip of his coffee, biting back a wince when he realizes how cold it is. How long was I stirring it? Time is getting away from him. Too much of it when he’s alone and not enough when he’s around Leo. He wonders just how long this will continue before he breaks.
It occurs to him that he could ask Dean to intervene. Leo hasn’t really done anything, though, if he’s being honest. The man shockingly hasn’t made any inappropriate jokes, his attention to Austin always staying in the professional sphere, if a little intense. There’s been no sexual harassment for Dean to act on, and Austin isn’t going to be the asshole who falsely accuses someone. And if I said he was distracting, that would say more about me than anything else, especially if the others don’t care. So, he bites his tongue, sticking his cup in the microwave to try and save at least one part of his day.
“Not good?” Dean asks, amused.
“Not at all,” he responds automatically, miserable. Dean laughs a little and Austin snaps back to reality, laughing nervously. “I probably timed it wrong. The coffee.”
“I hope the atmosphere’s working for you. Some people get overwhelmed, having so much responsibility. We work in small teams.”
“It’s great,” Austin reassures him emphatically, watching the microwave timer count down. “I love it. It’s a comfortable atmosphere, and I like having enough work to do. Just tune everything out and focus.” Liar. There’s one person you can’t tune out.
“That’s good,” Dean smiles, blowing across the surface of his coffee. “I’m glad it’s going well.”
Austin nods, opening the microwave before it can ding, and he almost jumps again when someone speaks from the doorway.
“You shouldn’t microwave Styrofoam. It’s carcinogenic,” Leo says kindly.
Or at least, he acts kind. Austin can’t be sure. He can’t be sure about anything involving Leo, which is Leo’s fault. It would be ironic, if Austin still had the humor to regard Leo without feeling like a kicked puppy.
“A little bit of chemicals never hurt anybody. Adds flavor,” Dean chuckles, winking at him. Austin swallows, feeling as if he’s watching a train wreck in slow motion.
He really doesn’t want Dean to like Leo. If he likes him, I have even less of a chance to do anything later. He finds himself wondering for a horrified moment if Dean would start something with Leo before telling himself it’s not possible. He knows his boss is professional. He thinks it would take a Herculean amount of desire to make Dean do something unprofessional, especially with someone who’s technically an employee.
But Leo has a history of making smart people do stupid things, he thinks. He’s not sure whether he should warn Dean or not. It’s not his business either way.
It certainly wasn’t Austin’s business when Leo convinced a friend of his to put together a surprise party on campus for Austin. Somehow, Leo’s excitement had been so infectious that he’d managed to get fifty people to show up. At the end of the day there had been a campus-wide email about reserving rooms and proper use of campus facilities. The only thing Leo had said was, Worth it.
“Maybe I want to die faster,” Austin says, playing it off as a joke even as he wishes desperately for the floor to swallow him.
“I’m sure you have a lot left to do,” Leo frowns, “and I know you’re important to the project. Even if I have no idea what those strings of code mean and whatever the squiggly lines are.”
“No, you’re right. They’re just squiggly lines; they aren’t for anything,” Dean snorts, “they add variety to our work. We just compile squiggly lines all day.”
“Wow, mystery solved. Maybe I should work here as an animator, too,” Leo laughs.
“We could always use another hand. You’re punctual, too, and we love that!”
My world is falling apart before my eyes over a cup of coffee, Austin thinks, wishing he could drown in his cup. My coffee, to be exact. He can already tell that Leo’s charmed Dean. Leo is supernaturally gifted at being at home; he makes friends like some people make toast. Quick, easy, ready to go. Kind of like his relationships.
Which, technically, so does Austin...but at least he’s clear about his intentions. He never purposely has a fling without letting his date know he’s not interested in long-term relationships. Although, if his morning call is anything to go by, maybe his method isn’t perfect, either. Now he gets the feeling he knows what it feels like to be a heartbreaker, and he doesn’t like it.
“You know, since I have you both in the same room, I’m scheduling some slots for animation checks later next month,” Dean says. “We want to make sure the timing with voicing and movement is good, so players don’t see any bad delays. When you can, sign up for the days by email. We’re having a few actor-animator pairs established to ensure consistency.”
“Oh, good,” Austin says faintly, reminding himself to keep a tab open with his email on it. The last thing he wants is for Leo to be his only choice. “Sounds like a good idea.”
People like him, he thinks hopefully, I’m sure he’ll get taken immediately. He thinks it’ll be easy to avoid him that way, leaving him to the mercy of his animator the entire time they’re on the project together. At the very least, I won’t have to see him for a few weeks, he thinks, suddenly relieved. He’ll have a break from Leo and a chance to focus on his work to the exclusion of everything else.
He can’t help but think someone, somewhere, has it out for him. His dream job and first real job in the industry and he’s haunted by an ex at the same time he gets put on a major project. He doesn’t think he knows anyone else who’s been subjected to worse timing in their life. It’s like karma decided to heap on the good and bad, balancing it out and shoving it into the tiniest span of time possible.
“Okay. Well, don’t work too hard,” Dean smiles, lifting his cup in a salute before leaving. Wait, Austin wants to say, jerking as if to follow him, but Leo is right there by the door.
He pauses. Just for a second, not realizing it. It’s all it takes for Leo to jump, moving away from the counter he was leaning against so casually. Austin immediately inhales sharply, trying to gauge what the other man wants.
“It’s been so long. I’ve been meaning to talk to you more,” Leo says, almost earnest. His eyes are bright, his whole body leaning closer as he speaks.
But he’s an actor, Austin tells himself, and he knows how to use body language. God, does he know. So Austin shuts himself away immediately, nails digging into the soft cup in his hand. He wonders if he could poke his fingers through it just for an excuse to run away to the bathroom, where he knows he can’t be followed.
“I’ve been busy,” Austin says. “I work here.”
“I noticed,” Leo laughs brightly. “So do I. Since it’s so busy with the project, I thought maybe you’d come along for drinks or something after work.”
His instinct is to say no. To flat out deny him, because if anything, Leo had always been good at staying away once denied. He’s not sure if it’ll work, though, since he’s honestly never heard of Leo trying to get someone back. He wonders if it’s just his luck or if maybe Leo just thinks he’s easy.
“Did you just say drinks?” Lina asks excitedly, ducking in suddenly. Oh, thank goodness, Austin thinks, ready to hand Leo off to her.
“...yeah,” Leo says, fumbling a little. Austin cheers internally, triumphant. This isn’t something he planned for.
“We should all go! It’s almost been a week; we should all get to know each other,” Lina grins cheerily, winking at Austin over the man’s shoulder. “It’ll be fun.”
Austin suddenly has the sinking feeling that Lina’s save is not what he thinks it is. She must think I’m shy, he thinks, horrified. She’s giving me support. She’ll probably even hype me up to Leo if I turn my back.
“I don’t think I can this Friday,” Austin says immediately, wincing in fake regret. “Plus, we’re getting together to talk about the project on Saturday.”
“Oh—we’ll do it Saturday, instead of our little get-together,” she says, gasping in realization. “You and I can look over our work next week if we need to. Rowan’s been wanting a drink. He’ll be happy to go!”
There’s no way for him to back out. She’s willing to rearrange, and there’s no way he can deter her. He knows if they don’t do it this week, she’ll try again the next and the next until she gets it planned right. He only has one choice, to go, make sure to turn Leo down, and never deal with him again.
It’s neutral ground, he thinks, contemplating. There’s no work oversight, no reason for Leo to think Austin is holding back for any reason. He’ll get the message loud and clear and if he doesn’t, Austin can always catch him being an asshole at work. Win-win.
“Well, if Rowan wants a drink,” Austin says, trying not to give Leo the satisfaction.
“Let’s do it,” Leo grins, winking, and Austin has to fight the urge to smile back. He reminds himself that Leo is a playboy, a cheater, and a pain in the ass. He’s not worth it.
It still takes him five full minutes of staring at his computer to get back to work, though.
***
HE GETS HOME IN THE evening, and all he can think about is Leo. Tan skin, careful fingers, and a voice that you want to hear played on repeat in your ear. Everything desirable rolled up into a neat, blond package.
Except Austin knows the truth. He’s acutely aware of the secret shadow Leo hides within him—the destructive beast lurking in the dark. He knows all too well what it is to be hurt by a person that makes you feel like the world. To be built up only to be knocked down, toppling like wood blocks from a tower game.
He wants to believe that things change; he really does. It’s just that he knows better. He’s seen breakups and on-and-off couples. He’s been through the periods of providing ice cream and a shoulder to cry on. He had promised himself not to become that. Not to be that guy. That sad sap. Now he’s in danger of being lured right back to where he began.
I refuse, he thinks, slicing into an apple a little more ferociously than necessary. He thinks about Leo’s smile and erases it from his head, concentrating on the task at hand. Not again. Never again. He’s not about to waste another minute of his life pretending that he can make it work. He knows better. Far better.