Faking In Love [bxb]

4. A Lesson On Hooking Up In The Office

"How come you don't have a huge honking ring on your finger?" were the first words that came out of Jenny's mouth on Monday morning. If I weren't for his sharp reflexes, Amir might have dumped his mug of tea all over himself. It was a truly near thing too.

"Who told you I'm engaged?" He hissed from his desk.

There were the only ones in the office thankfully. The gossip consuming ears had not yet resumed although they had a very thin window of opportunity before Busybody Becca came in for work. Busybody Becca was the office pretty girl who happened literally plopped herself in the middle of any personal discussion. The girl could not resist a good story. Literally. Once an important meeting with the media company that owned the magazine was called and she was almost late because she heard the janitors discussing about a few execs that had a quickie in the office a few floors up.

She'd most likely eat up this engagement story with her chompers' wide open.

"I have my sources." Jenny smirked into her mug.

Amir was silent for a moment "Daisy at the deli?"

"Yep. Told me some cute gay couple made everyone cry last Friday with an engagement that rivaled Sandra Bullock's. Besides you blurted something about it at work last week when you got some text message. I just put the pieces together." He'd forgotten all about that. Frankly his mind had been occupied with thoughts about Sebastian's family, his mother's pleas on knowing who it was he was seeing and the trip it seemed he would have to take to America.

On the bright side, Bas was being a real trooper and didn't let him carry any of the loads alone since they were in it together.

On the dark side, he still wanted to kill Bas.

Very much.

In painful ways.

With creative methods.

Amir sighed "It's almost chaotic Jen. My life just went from peaceful to dodging phone calls from literally everyone."

"Oh." She remarked interestedly.

"Firstly my Mum's trying to wear me out by nagging me about my new boyfriend – spoiler alert no I don't have one. At first I thought this would be an easy story to sell but she's taken it to new heights. Do you know she downloaded an app to track my phone calls? Obviously it didn't work but Khadija had a blast telling me all about it." He drank his tea. "Then Sebastian's family is all but swimming out across the ocean to come see us."

Her eyes widened "They're really enthusiastic aren't they?"

He groaned "Enthusiastic doesn't even begin to cover it."

They were crazy arse Americans.

Not even an exaggeration.

"On Sunday, I had to drive all the way to his flat just to Skype with his parents." It was not a fun thing. Especially since he was busy in the bathroom with the new Jake Bass video when he received the call.

"His mother actually burst into tears at the sight of me. Granted it was grainy and all but the woman was almost hyperventilating. And she was freaking HAPPY." Amir shook his head. "I'm scared about what's going to happen when we meet in the flesh."

Jen grinned "At least they're the accepting kind."

"Bas says they're all liberals. They'd accept Martians with open arms." He said. "And his grandfather is another story entirely."

"What about him?"

"He called but didn't speak to me. Sebastian said that he only wants to meet me face to face which scares the hell out of me. At least through calls and messages I can let down the foundation. But a direct face to face meeting would throw me off guard the first time." He explained in a semi-panicked mode.