fic: I don't even know, ok? Ryan plans weddings.
Title Ryan Ross: Wedding Planner (What We Do Is Love)
Author adellyna
Pairing Ryan/Brendon, Jon/Spencer
Ratings R(ish) for language
Summary Ryan plans weddings! Just not gay weddings. Ok, maybe just this once.
Disclaimer Nobody thinks this is real. Please don’t try to convince a judge otherwise.
Author’s Note Ok, this was supposed to be cracked out, with two-dimensional!bitchy!Ryan, and instead it’s… this. Whoops.
“No.” Ryan Ross doesn’t have time for this. It’s not even on his schedule, actually, and he barely has time for the things that are on it: the doggy spa for his Pomeranian (Pete), a mani/pedi at the people spa next door, eleven minutes at the newsstand picking up his favorites, a dress fitting with Brad Pitt’s cousin, the list goes on and on. Nowhere on it is ‘plan a gay wedding.’ “I don’t do gays,” he says, ignoring the fact that he is gay and does do gays all the time. “Nobody wears a dress, Brendon. I can’t plan a wedding without the dress. My firm is called Traditional Elegance for a reason, you know.”
This is the thirteenth gay couple Ryan has rejected in the last seven months though, and Brendon keeps saying he’s afraid that Out magazine is literally going to turn on them any minute now, snarling like a pack of ravening wolves. Ryan says Brendon should know, since he was apparently raised by just that sort.
“They’re really nice,” Brendon says soothingly. He’s fidgeting like he’d rather bubble and enthuse, but Ryan made him go to a voice coach to learn how to speak melodically. There's just no place for shrieking in their offices; the only shrillness Ryan will tolerate is from Pete or one of his brides.
Ryan brushes a microscopic bit of lint off his lapel (Brendon is pretty sure that the lint, in Ryan’s mind at least, looks exactly like two men in tuxedos) and glances disinterestedly at the folder in Brendon’s hand. “Nice is great, really. Is one of them nice and a woman?”
“Well, no. But one of them is pretty like a girl.”
“Pretty enough to wear a wedding gown, maybe?” Ryan also turns down weddings that would take place on water-skis, in the midst of something tacky like sky-diving or, worse, hanging oneself from hooks and body piercings. Additionally, if the bride is ugly. Ryan absolutely cannot abide an unattractive bride. What would that even look like in his portfolio?
Brendon just opens the folder to the photo of the couple and taps his forefinger above their smiling faces. And, ok, they’re both exceptionally attractive and, when he looks close, the prettier one appears to be wearing girl’s jeans. Ryan can maybe, maybe work with this. “I can maybe work with this,” he admits grudgingly. “But I’m not committing. They have to come in for a prospective client interview. And if that goes well, I have to go to their house, and if I spot a single piece of rainbow paraphernalia, I am getting a restraining order.”
***
The first meeting goes well and the home visit even better. Jon and Spencer’s house is tastefully decorated with a mix of woods and fabrics that are durable but also beautiful. Ryan thinks Jon looks durable but also beautiful, though it’s Spencer who really catches his fancy. Spencer glows with good grooming and inner bitchiness. He’s like a hand-embroidered, raw silk throw pillow, all buffed nails and carefully coordinated clothes. Ryan wants to steal him away and buy him a little carrying case like Pete’s and put little shirts on him. A sweater vest, maybe.
Even better, neither Jon nor Spencer does anything on the list of Things You May Do In A Trailer Park, But Not In The Presence of Ryan Ross. Things like calling each other Poopsie and Snickerdoodle or playing foot-wrestling games or mentioning any poor and/or mentally ill relations. Food items are served looking as though they’ve never come in contact with disposable dishware, the tea is perfect and English, and when Pete humps Jon’s leg, Jon just laughs softly and scratches him between the ears.
Ryan beams proudly and places his teacup into its saucer with a delicate clink, easing the whole set onto the (antique, if he’s not mistaken) table next to him. “There are just a few questions I need to get out of the way,” he says serenely. “Most of them I’d like to discuss with the two of you as a couple, but there is an important query or two I need to make of you individually, so Jon, if you’ll excuse us?” He says it regally, as though it’s perfectly acceptable to dismiss a man from his own home, and Jon stands without a fuss. Ryan could kiss Jon Walker. He’s the perfect groom.
When he and Spencer are alone, Ryan curves his palms around the arms of his chair and smiles warmly. “Spencer,” he says. “Have we ever slept together?”
“Pardon me?”
It’s an important question, really; the awkwardness that ensues when one of the happy couple realizes that they have, at some point in their past, fucked the wedding planner? It’s not a pretty sight. It happened to Ryan just two years ago, the dawning realization that he and the groom had had a one-night stand during the groom’s experimental college years. The bonus check at the end had been more than enough to ensure his silence, but the tenseness had given him three gray hairs. Three. He took a six week series of scalp massage from two very skilled Moroccan ex-harem girls, and he’s pretty sure they’ve moved on from that nightmare, but it never hurts to be careful.
“It’s not that I don’t think you’d be memorable, Spencer,” he says kindly, “but my younger years were a whirlwind of bright lights and pretty boys, so. If you could just put my mind at ease, we can move on to talking about things like themes and centerpieces.”
Spencer smiles sweetly back at him and speaks with a wryly bitchy tone that warms Ryan’s heart. “It’s safe to say I haven’t had the pleasure, Ryan.”
Questioning Jon yields a similar result, only with pink-tipped ears and adorable head ducking and Spencer and Jon are officially Ryan’s favorite couple yet. And Ryan did the wedding of Miss Georgia and her darling Junior Senator fiancé, so that’s saying a lot. Oh, the crinoline. He’ll just have to do a beauty queen wedding after this one, to make up for the shameful lack of a gown.
“So,” he says brightly when he’s got them both seated across from him again. They’re holding hands, Jon’s thumb sweeping steadily across Spencer’s knuckles. The whole house smells like the cinnamonny perfection Jon seems to have slipped into the oven while Ryan was questioning Spencer and Pete’s claimed a spot with his rump in Spencer’s lap and his head on Jon’s thigh. “So,” he repeats, “I’ve never done a gay wedding before. Which one of you is the bride?”
Jon and Spencer exchange an intimate glance that makes Ryan’s toes curl from all the way across the (sublime, tufted, chocolate velvet) ottoman. Spencer strokes skritching fingers down Pete’s back and does that lip quirking thing that Ryan is learning to associate with oncoming bitchery. “We’re both men,” he drawls. “We thought you understood…”
Spencer is Ryan’s favorite person ever. He wonders if Jon would notice if Ryan gave Brendon better hair (Spencer’s hair) and switched them out.
“So it’s obviously you, then. The grooms never talk back like that.” What he really wants to say is ‘where have you been all my life, Spencer Smith, and how familiar are you with organic cuisine?’
***
Ryan calls the office on his way back to give Brendon the good news. Also, to make sure Brendon knows to pick up his dry-cleaning, check the supply of dog poo bags, and to pull the venue list and have it waiting on his desk, but he opens with their acceptance of the Walker-Smith wedding. It’s enough to make Brendon seem really happy about plastic baggies that will inevitably contain dog shit though, and that might even make Ryan - safe in the privacy of his car - crack a smile.
When he makes it back and steps into the cool, empty lobby, the phone is off the hook and Brendon is nowhere to be seen, though there are cheerful shuffling noises coming from the supply closet. It used to be way worse than this, Brendon used to do his victory dance in the middle of the lobby. Once (the last time it ever happened), he’d bopped right into someone’s grandmother’s lap. In her wheelchair. From that moment on, Ryan had banished Brendon’s interpretive and/or celebratory dance numbers to confined spaces. Like the supply closet. Or the bathroom. Or, best of all, Brendon’s own house.
There’s a muffled thump, the tinkling of hundreds of paperclips raining onto the terrazzo tile, and what sounds awfully like Brendon’s elbow colliding with the door. Ryan gently replaces the phone on its hook and hops up onto the corner of Brendon’s desk. The venue file is on it, open, and Brendon’s already started flagging information sheets. There’s one for the park that’s about an hour away- a really gorgeous place with massive trees and beautifully dappled light. The Post It attached to this one says ‘gay guys love nature and shit!’ in Brendon’s round, happy scrawl.
When they’d gone to scout the location, Brendon had packed a picnic lunch. He’d spread the blanket on the ground near the lake, fussed with it until it was smooth, even brought regular silverware because he knows how much Ryan hates the fake stuff. Ryan had wandered, photographing the angles and the way the light melts across the surface of the lake, the way the trees thin and finally relent, giving way to the open clearing that wraps around and embraces the water. A number of these photographs are framed and hang in a long, straight row in Brendon’s living room. The one of Brendon laying careful place settings, his face smooth and intent, hangs in Ryan’s.
There'd been so many assistants before Brendon. If Ryan has it his way, there won't be any after, though he might be getting Brendon one, if their business keeps growing this way.
He hears the door swing open and glances over his shoulder at it. The doorway is empty, and Ryan cocks his head to the side. “Bren?”
“Here! I’m here!” Brendon’s voice is muffled. Ryan has to lean over and look down to see Brendon on his hands and knees, gathering paperclips and shoving them back into the box. They won’t fit, Ryan knows. You can’t put a full box of paper clips back to rights once they’ve been spilled. They’re like secrets in that way.
Brendon’s got the last of them in his clenched fist, trying to cram them back into the box, which is already bulging at the seams. “I need some more of those in my office,” Ryan says idly, “if you don’t mind.”
He hears the creak of Brendon’s shoes as he sits up onto his haunches, catches the thumbing of glasses back into place from the corner of his eye. “No,” Brendon says, and there’s the note of vague relief that Ryan hears whenever a minor catastrophe is averted. In other words, at least twice a day. “No problem. I’ll go do that now- oh, you found the venue file! And there’s a message for you. Out magazine called.”
“Called?” Ryan fans the top flap of the file with his thumb, angling his chin up to protect his hair from the vague breeze it generates. “Why would they call?”
“Well. I guess technically they called back.”
Sigh. This was to be the exception, not the rule. Spencer and Jon are great, it’s true, and Brendon’s instincts about people are usually pretty spot on, but Ryan doesn’t want to be the city’s premiere gay wedding planner. He loves the glamour of a traditional, heterosexual wedding. He loves the aisle and the wedding march and the dress and the veil and the headpieces. Oh, the headpieces, with pearls and crystal. Ryan loves going with the bride to the beauty salon and helping her pick a hair style. He loves being invited to bachelorette parties and helping the bridesmaids dye their shoes. He loves the way the bride’s father looks when they walk down the aisle together, he loves the pomp and the ceremony. And even though he’s possibly the least religious person ever, he likes church weddings with priests. For his last really religious couple, they got the church choir to do the wedding march a capella. Ryan may have cried. A little. Really, really little.
“Brendon,” he says, sighing. “Bren. I’m doing this wedding because I really like Spencer. And Jon. But I don’t want every gay in town beating down my doors looking for a commitment ceremony.”
“A really beautiful commitment ceremony,” Brendon corrects guilelessly.
That’s beside the point though. Ryan snaps the venue file shut and tries to look stern, even if he’s quite pleased. “I know. But seriously, Brendon, I want to plan weddings. Regular weddings with one bride and one groom. I could plan bar mitzvahs too, but I don’t want to, ok?”
“Ok, fine.” Brendon’s head bows, his glasses slide off a little, and he pokes at a few stray paperclips, seemingly gathering his nerve the same way. “But. Ok, it’s just that you’re really amazing at this, Ryan. And you’re gay, so even if we never do another gay wedding again, I don’t see why it’s so wrong for you to be recognized. For your talent.”
The office is quiet. The fan whirs overhead, the copier huffs and settles in to sleep, water trickles down the fountain in the corner, but neither Ryan nor Brendon say anything.
“I’ll talk to them,” Ryan says finally. “But I’m not promising anything.”
***
He finally settles on a handful of locations to show Jon and Spencer. With a lot of couples, you can take just one person to see them. Usually the bride, since grooms are notoriously inclined to either agree to the first just to get it over with or to be too afraid of the bride’s wrath to agree to any.
It’s a little different with these two. Jon says, “It’s beautiful, but I would want Spence to see it before I made a decision” to all but one of the locations. At the last location he takes one look at the busy hotel bar in the lobby, the way the room’s windows overlook the second bar by the pool and says, very simply, “No.”
Spencer is more likely to pick everything apart. “It’s nice, I guess, but we’d prefer something with hardwood floors, if we’re going to be inside.” “I like that it’s outside, but I don’t want the tents to look like they’re floating. There aren’t enough trees.” “I don’t like the manager here. I’m pretty sure he had a mullet.”
Finally Ryan realizes he has to take them both or they’re never going to make a decision. He’s managed to cobble together a rough list of places he thinks will meet both of their needs; the last of these is the park Brendon had earmarked from the start.
They meet at Ryan’s office on a Saturday and pack into Jon’s hybrid. “Jon likes to drive,” Spencer says. “And he doesn’t get to, not often. Do you mind?” Ryan does mind, actually, and if it was Jon making the request, he would probably say no. You can’t say no to your brides though, that’s Ryan’s first rule.
Brendon climbs into the front seat to navigate for Jon and Ryan finds himself in the back with Spencer. There’s a little cooler in the space between their feet; it’s not Styrofoam, and Ryan has the sudden happy flash of these two driving hours and hours to spend a single night on the shore, getting in at sunset to kick their feet in the foam where it exhales against the sand and then washes back out again. For the first time in his years of planning weddings, he thinks he might like to get married.
“Where’s Pete?” Jon asks, the car in gear, the turn signal on, his brow screwed up in confusion.
“Oh,” Ryan says. “I left him at home. We’ll be driving most of the day and I didn’t want to add to your stress.”
Spencer clicks his seatbelt closed. It makes a firm, decisive sound and he nods to match it. “That’s silly. We love Pete. Where do you live? Let’s go get him.”
Brendon navigates the scant few miles between Ryan’s apartment and the office, chattering constantly. He never misses a turn though, always interrupting his story of how they got Pete, “From this guy I knew through a friend of mine and Ryan wanted a puppy. Well, he needed a puppy, he works too much and I don’t think his TV is even plugged in so it’s always too quiet in his apartment. But anyway, we got to the place and the guy, like, man, he did not treat his dogs well, like, at all. And there was this one that was littler than the others and his coloring wasn’t really right and the guy was really mean to the dog, like, he kept trying to shut it in this tiny cage and it kept barking but really quiet and I thought maybe the guy wasn’t feeding it as much or something, and Ryan asked how much for the one in the cage and the guy said he wasn’t selling that one because his papers weren’t ready which was obviously a total lie - turn left at the light - because the guy was just shady, right? But anyway - second right up there and then it’s the first building, the green one - Ryan ended up paying, like, 50% extra for the runt of the litter. He turned out to be, well, he’s Pete though, right? So we got the better end of the bargain. Oh, and then we called the ASPCA on that fu- guy’s ass, so.”
Ryan’s relieved when they pull up in front of his apartment, he can hand his keys over to Brendon and try to ignore the way that Spencer’s smirking at him. Like he has some sort of marshmallow filling and needs the words ‘puppy champion’ printed on his business cards. It’s bullshit. He just wanted a little dog. Everyone likes little dogs these days, they‘re trendy. Plus, that cage was really small. And the guy was really shady. And fine, maybe Ryan doesn’t like it when the underdog gets pushed even further under. It’s just not right.
“So,” he says, clearing his throat. “Three places. I’ve got three. Two are outdoors, the third is a really nice old plantation style house with a massive wrap-around porch, so it could easily be an indoor/outdoor wedding there, if it strikes your fancy. The first outdoor one is a large public garden. There’s a lot of color this time of year, so that’s nice, but I think it might be a little too confined for your taste. The second outdoor one is a park about an hour away.” For many reasons that far exceed Brendon’s original note of ‘gay guys love nature and shit’, Ryan believes this will be the place they choose.
Brendon tumbles back into the car with a wheeze and a grin, Pete scrambling for footing against his scrawny little legs. “Oh, I love that place. You guys are going to love that place.”
***
There’s something about Spencer and Jon that turns off every painstakingly installed filter in Brendon’s brain. Ryan gets the distinct impression that these three will be friends long after the caterers pack up and all the thank you cards are sent.
He’s a little lonely, when everyone climbs out of the car at the park; even though it’s not fair to be. He’s hung back with his folder, Spencer has Pete in his arms, Brendon is gesticulating excitedly toward the benches with the flowers growing up the sides, the winding path through the woods. “Ryan said something about flower petals all along here,” he’s saying, voice fading. “He wants to do everything organic or biodegradable.”
“Hey,” Spencer says. It startles Ryan, he almost drops his notes when he looks up. Spencer had been off with Jon, right? And Jon was following in the wake of Brendon, so.
“Hey,” Ryan says back. “I’m coming, I promise, I printed the weather reports for the last ten years for the week you want, and I wanted to pull them so we could see what we could maybe expect. Also, I’ve got a photocopy of the Farmer’s Almanac for predictions for this year.”
Spencer closes the binder and takes it from Ryan, pressing it to his chest. “We can do all that later.” He falls silent then, his head turned toward the trees where they can still catch flashes of Brendon, his pink hoodie darting from tree to tree. Jon’s harder to spot, in dark blue and moving slower. “It’s really beautiful here,” Spencer says. “Thanks. For finding it. And for doing this, I know you had some reservations.”
“Oh.” He doesn’t really know what to say. Usually the thank you comes in the form of a hastily scribbled card a week or two after the wedding. Never this, never someone leaning quietly against the car next to him, squinting into the sun, shoulders brushing. He doesn’t get the feeling that Spencer is coming onto him - if he did, he’d quit on the spot - but he does feel like he’s being offered something. Whatever it is that Brendon strikes up with people on the first meeting. Friendship, maybe. “I’m happy to,” he says carefully. “Love should be celebrated.”
Brendon’s laugh floats across to them; it’s not all that far to the lake, it’s just that the thick belt of trees makes you feel isolated once you get there. “Sure,” Spencer says, his smile careless and free. “That, and you totally think Jon has a great ass. It’s ok, he does, and the truth, Ryan, the truth should always be celebrated.”
Ryan’s binder is on the front seat and the door locked before he even knows what’s happening.
“I need that,” he says, fingertips pressed to the window.
Spencer tucks his arm through Ryan’s and shakes his head. “Nope. You don’t need notes to feel the ambiance of the place. Anyway, I’m the bride, and I demand that you look at pretty flowers with me without taking a single note. And, if my suspicions are correct, help me get Brendon out of the tree he’ll inevitably but oh-so-unwisely climb.”
***
Ryan’s phone rings on a Wednesday at nine in the morning. It’s Spencer’s number on the display and Ryan has to actually stop and look at it, trying to figure out how to answer. Spencer’s called every day since they found the right location, sometimes with actual questions but sometimes just to make insane suggestions until Ryan finds himself laughing helplessly.
“I’ve been thinking that maybe we should have a space themed wedding,” he’d said yesterday. Ryan could hear clacking in the background, water running. He was pretty sure Spencer was doing dishes. “Like, we’ll wear space suits and fake an anti-grav walk down the aisle. All the guests will get little alien antennae to wear and the cake can be in the shape of a flying saucer. What do you think?”
On Saturday he’d called with an ‘emergency’ that ‘absolutely necessitated’ Ryan meeting him at the Starbucks two blocks from the office. No, he couldn’t elaborate, it was too urgent, no time. When Ryan showed up, Spencer was curled into one of the corner armchairs with a book and a hot chocolate. “What,” Ryan said, trying to keep calm. “Is everyone ok? Injured? Are you alright?”
“Everyone’s in good health,” he said. “But I’m trying to do the crossword in today’s paper and I can’t for the life of me come up with a ten letter word for ‘mountain system.’”
Ryan’s disbelieving look had been met with one of such angelic innocence that he’d had to blink. “It’s giving me wrinkles,” Spencer had said. “I can’t have wrinkles on my wedding day. It’ll ruin the pictures.”
So usually Ryan would answer the phone with “Ryan Ross,” but he’s not sure that’s appropriate anymore. Just “Ryan” seems really weird, so.
“Hey,” is what he ends up saying, when he realizes the phone’s been ringing forever and it’ll go to voicemail soon.
Spencer says “Hey,” back, and Ryan can sort of tell that he’s smiling. Apparently he did something right back at the park and took Spencer Smith up on what he was offering. Ryan can’t find it in his heart to regret it, whatever it was.
“No cowboy weddings either,” Ryan says. “Brendon will insist that Jon learns how to lasso so he can rope you and drag you down the aisle and Spencer, I can’t call my attorney and ask him to draft a waiver for that sort of thing, ok?”
His door swings open, like, immediately. Brendon pops his head in, beaming (note to self: get office soundproofed). “I think that’s a great idea, actually,” he says. “Let me get Jon on the phone, he’ll love it.”
Spencer laughs on the other end of the phone. It’s pretty much the definition of infectious, so Ryan’s laughing too, right through wadding up a piece of paper and throwing it at Brendon’s retreating head. “No,” Spencer says. “I’m just wondering when my dress fitting is. I mean, I know there’s not an actual dress, but I am going to be wearing something, right?”
“God, I hope so.” Ryan realizes he’s smiling stupidly at the phone, like Spencer can see him and smile back. His first impression was right after all, Spencer’s rapidly become Ryan’s favorite person in the world. He’s surprised to find that it twinges a little, trying to figure out if it’s really Spencer or Brendon who holds the title; Ryan hasn’t ever given a whole lot of thought to whether or not Brendon is important to him. It‘s something he‘s been trying not to dwell on, so he flips his calendar open and snags a pen. “I can mark you down for some shopping. In ink, even.”
“Oh, nice. I qualify for ink. When’s good?”
And the thing about Ryan’s schedule is that there really isn’t a ‘good’, every day is so packed. Most every appointment he makes is tentative, prone to shifting, but he wants to give Spencer something back for the daily phone calls, so. “I’m pretty free. When did you have in mind?”
“Tomorrow afternoon, maybe? Jon’s got a late meeting, so I’ll just be lonely and moping. And then eating, if you want to come over after.” Spencer pauses, Ryan fancies that he can hear traces of hesitation in his breath, in the way the background noise has stopped too. “You can bring Brendon,” he says casually. “If you like. We can pretend we’ve never heard the word wedding. Jon’s lasagna is to die for, and I can throw Texas Toast in the oven like nobody’s business.”
Ryan usually eats alone. Or he eats on dates. Sometimes he has business lunches where he networks. Then, of course, there are the times he takes his couples out for planning meals, but he’s always working then too. It’s pretty much never that he has an invitation to go to someone’s house and sit back and be served. “Um,” he says, which is another thing he does pretty much never. “That sounds, uh. Yeah. I mean, I’ll try to keep my schedule clear. Things come up, but I’ll definitely try.”
They hang up, and Ryan definitely doesn’t think about what Spencer was implying when he suggested that Ryan bring Brendon.
***
If someone had asked Ryan to write an essay on the exact opposite of wedding gown shopping, it would have fallen tragically short of his shopping trip with Spencer. Instead of seeking formal wear, Spencer tries to drag Ryan into Hot Topic and Forever 21. Ryan draws a hard line when he sees Spencer making eyes at Wet Seal; he considers it a victory.
“What were you thinking?” He says, when the mall doors swoosh open and welcome them to the bustling artificial winter. “Tuxedos? Suits? I think matching suits might be a little much, but unmatching suits would be tricky, so maybe-”
“Ooh,” Spencer interrupts, veering off toward an open doorway that’s spilling punk music into the hall. “Jeans!”
It’s going to be a long day.
Spencer is a shopping fiend. Like, Ryan thought he could get a lot done, but Spencer’s just a narrow, stylish blur whizzing from rack to rack. He ends up with four bags full and Ryan doesn’t even know what’s in them.
In a stroke of genius, he points Spencer toward a shoe store. “Oooooh,” Spencer says, eyes lighting up. “Shoes!”
They end up with a wall of shoeboxes stacked high around them, but at least Spencer has to sit still while he tries them on, so Ryan can get something done. “Spencer,” he says, prepping the pair of Keds with little whales on them. He’s pretty sure they’re girl shoes. He’s also pretty sure Spencer doesn’t care. “We do need to talk about what you’re going to wear, you know?”
“I know,” Spencer says, but he’s got his head tilted at his outstretched feet. “I think these shoes make my feet look small, right? But the glitter, Ryan, the glitter.”
With anybody else, Ryan would have a headache. All he has now is the desire to laugh his ass off and possibly mock Spencer for his glittery shoes. “I’ll make sure there’s plenty of glitter in the wedding, it’ll be positively dripping with fairy dust. You, on the other hand, will be naked.”
Spencer cocks an eyebrow at Ryan and snags the Keds. “Naked? Kinky. I think I should tell you that you’re not my type. Anyway, I already know part of what I’m wearing. I’ve still got the shirt I wore on my first date with Jon. I want to wear that.”
Now this, this Ryan can work with. “Ok,” he says, nodding. The next shoebox has Sketchers in them. Green. “Ok, what color is it? We can find a good tie to go with it, get you a nice black suit.”
“It’s pink,” Spencer says. “It has a bunch of ladybugs in the shape of a heart, and then one of them is crawling away.” He smiles, and it’s a secret, warm sort of smile that makes Ryan’s hands still on the laces he’s been fixing. Spencer’s fingers trace a little line from his stomach down to his hip and he says, dreamily, “Jon really liked that one. The one that got away.”
It’s sweet. Kind of a glimpse into their past, and Ryan’s gearing up to ask about the first date when the horrendous bombshell that Spencer dropped on him registers. “Wait. Wait. It’s a t-shirt?”
As it turns out, it is a t-shirt. It further turns out that Spencer actually does intend to wear jeans to the wedding. “But dark rinse,” he says earnestly. “Straight leg. Classy jeans!”
He agrees to a jacket, a dark grey number that Ryan layers over a lighter grey striped button up. These two over the pink shirt, with the dark jeans, and some sort of respectable shoe (Ryan plans to break into Spencer’s house and temporarily steal every shoe he owns that isn’t black), and it’s… well, it’s still the least weddingy outfit Ryan has ever seen worn to a wedding. And Spencer’s the bride for fuck’s sake.
It does look good though, he has to admit. Spencer puts it all on as soon as they get back, modeling, and it‘s very. It’s very Spencer. And because it’s so Spencer, Ryan realizes, it’s also very Jon.
“What’s Jon going to wear?” Ryan asks, as soon as his stomach stops fizzing.
Spencer shrugs, his hands smoothing the garments on their hangers. “Probably slacks and a button up. It’s kind of his default when it comes to dressing up.”
Which will work, actually. Ryan just needs to find slacks that will match Spencer’s jacket and a button up that will match Spencer’s t-shirt. And then, if he’s lucky, he can cajole Jon into wearing a tie of some sort and tada, the wedding will look like a wedding again. Sort of.
“Oh, hey, look.” Spencer’s unpacking things from his shopping bags, sorting by the care instructions so that he can pre-wash. How much does Ryan love that he pre-washes his garments? A lot. A whole lot.
He’s holding up a t-shirt. A really small t-shirt in a warm sort of amber color. Ryan can only see the back, but then Spencer turns it around and Ryan is confronted with. Well. They’re like rosettes, he thinks. But they’re smooshed mostly flat, so there’s just the faint texture of them, rising in a long, twisted mass that stretches down from the shoulder. It’s all warm, vibrant reds with deeper blacks and burgundies that fall in the shadows of the ridges. Actually, it’s gorgeous. “I got this for you,” Spencer says, carefully refolding the shirt. “Your wardrobe needs some frivolity.”
“Oh. Thanks.” It seems really inadequate. Just the one word, short, mostly consonants. Ryan feels kind of like he should make a speech. Or maybe hug Spencer. Is hugging too much?
“Shit. We forgot to put the lasagna in.”
***
It’s two in the morning and Ryan kind of wants to cry. He has a huge wedding the next day. Huge. One he’s been planning for months, one that’s taken up a good half of his working hours, one he’d thought he was completely prepared for. He’d thought that right up until seven o’clock when he’d been on his way home and the bride called. She’d been casual, but he’d heard her voice waver a time or two, so he wasn’t buying that shit for a minute. And she shouldn’t be casual. The couple had decided that, in lieu of gifts, they’d like people to make donations to the Make A Wish Foundation. All of the wedding invitations clearly stated that donation cards and envelopes would be made available at the reception.
The bride had promised Ryan that she was going to take care of all of this- she had a friend who was an artist, he was going to design the card, they’d bring them to the wedding already made out to each guest and with a personalized thank you card included, yada yada, etc etc. It had been kind of a stupid idea, if you asked Ryan, but he wasn’t going to be responsible for it, so whatever.
Eighteen hours before the ceremony starts, she tells Ryan that her friend has flaked and that they have neither the donation cards nor the envelopes. “They have to be personalized,” she says, verging on frantic now. “He gave me back all of the thank you cards, Ryan, but I’d already put names on all of them, Ryan.” Ryan’s turn signal is already on, he’s waiting to make a U-Turn.
That was seven hours ago. He’d gone straight back to the office, mocked up something in Photoshop, took it to Kinkos, picked up the (fucking personalized) Thank You cards from the bride’s house, and now he’s staring at four hundred envelopes that need to be marked with names and stuffed with Thank You cards. Four. Hundred.
He really wants to cry.
Brendon’s finally passed out in the lobby; Ryan doesn’t begrudge him the sleep, but there is no way he’s going to be able to get this done, even if he does wake Brendon up.
Instead of crying, he does the very first thing he can think to do when his throat is tight and his eyes are itchy and breathing is becoming kind of a tense situation: he calls Spencer.
His chest gets tighter while the phone rings, and it doesn’t loosen up until he hears Jon’s groggy voice on the other end. “Hello?”
“Hi,” Ryan says. “It’s Ryan. Ross. Ryan Ross. I’m so sorry to call you so late, really, I’m so sorry. Um.”
He hears muffled yawning and the slide of fabric on fabric, the distant sound of Jon deciding he’d rather hand the phone off to Spencer than listen to Ryan babble. “S’Ryan,” Jon says, and then Spencer’s on the phone saying his name.
“Yeah.” Suddenly, Ryan feels even more like crying, and he can’t figure out why he thought calling one of his clients in the middle of a night to panic was a good idea.
“Did you die?” Spencer asks. “Are you calling me from beyond the grave? Cuz you‘d better. I will be so pissed at you if you die and don‘t call to let me know.”
And he doesn’t sound angry, not at all. It makes Ryan break into thin, hysterical laughter, somewhere in the midst of which he starts relating the story. “- I have calligraphy pens,” he babbles, “but there’s four hundred envelopes. Spencer, what am I going to do? I can’t, there’s no way I can do all of these. I have to be at the venue in six hours to make sure the set up is going right and then I have to go to the limo place and then I have to-”
Spencer just talks over him. It starts with shushing, and when Ryan’s voice quiets but keeps going, Spencer starts talking more firmly. “I’ll be there in twenty,” he says, and Ryan starts to protest but he hears Jon say something in the background and then Spencer is back, talking even more loudly over him. “We’ll be there in twenty. Don’t argue.”
He doesn’t.
They show up, bleary but adorable, in pajama pants and t-shirts with hoodies hastily zipped over them. Jon has a smudge of toothpaste in the corner of his mouth. For the first time all night, Ryan doesn’t want to cry.
“I have bitchin’ penmanship,” Spencer says, tucking an arm around Ryan’s shoulders. “Lead me to your fine writing implements and high quality paper products and I shall write names so beautifully that you will weep from the artistry of it.”
“I make bitchin’ coffee,” Jon adds. He’s produced a bag of coffee beans from somewhere. Ryan doesn’t know where they came from and, quite frankly, he doesn’t care. It’s enough that Jon’s eyes are crinkling at the corners and that Brendon is stirring to the sounds of their voices and that Spencer’s at his desk cooing over the silver envelopes and that he’s not alone in the middle of the fucking night with this crisis on his hands.
Brendon, who’s too busy purring over the bag of beans to notice that his glasses are skewed and smudged, leads Jon to the coffee pot. Spencer’s just there. Being calm and Spencer-like, with his hands tucked in the pocket of his hoodie and his eyes squinted into a sleepy smile.
Two hours later, they’re so close to done that it makes Ryan want to cry again; in relief, this time. “Lissy Furbush,” Jon says. “Really? Furbush? That’s. I can’t even. Spence, please tell me we can change our names to Furbush? Jon and Spencer Furbush.”
“God, no,” Spencer retorts, his fingers careful on the o’s, quick to slash through the t’s. “The lesbians would never stop calling, Jon. It would be wall to wall lesbians all the time. They eat so much, we’d be broke in, like, a week.”
It’s been like this the whole time. Jon and Spencer mocking name after name. “Oh wow. We have to, have to, have to name our first born Xenoplin.”
“First born? Is there something you need to tell me?”
Brendon gets less done than anyone else, he’s too tired to do anything but laugh breathlessly at even the lamest jokes, but he does refill everyone’s coffee and even runs to the gas station down the street when Spencer declares that he cannot possibly write another name until he has powdered mini-donuts.
They leave the envelopes -- all four hundred of them, stuffed and personalized -- in Ryan’s trunk. “I’m sorry for calling,” Ryan muffles into the fierce hug that Spencer gives him at the end of the night. “But thank you for coming. Thank you so much.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Spencer says gently. “Of course we came. We’re your friends.”
He doesn’t get any sleep. Not really, not in the long run. They don’t finish until five; Ryan takes Brendon home with him because Brendon’s apartment is twenty minutes further away and he’s way too loopy to drive. Brendon passes out on the couch the minute his head hits the cushion, glasses still on, mouth open, his arm dangling off the side.
It’s. It’s just Brendon, really. Ryan’s fingers itch with the need to pull off the glasses, plump up a pillow, and tuck Brendon’s hand back to his chest. It takes everything he has to go to bed without doing it.
***
Two weeks before Jon and Spencer’s wedding, Ryan comes back to his office to discover that it’s been the site of a hurricane. Or possibly just Brendon. There’s paper everywhere, stacks of it piled on top of every semi-flat surface, single pieces strewn about the floor, the printer whirring and spitting out even more. “Um,” Ryan says, freezing with his toes overlapping the piece of paper that sticks out under the door. “What the hell?”
“Jon’s being romantic,” Brendon says happily.
Ryan kind of fails to see how trashing Traditional Elegance counts as romance. Unless, like, he and Brendon are running away together and Brendon’s always really wanted to stick one to the man. The man being Ryan, of course. “This is very romantic,” he says wryly. “God, I wish a man would make a huge mess for me.”
He catches a flash of something in Brendon’s eyes. It’s either longing or shame, and Ryan’s a little disturbed that he can’t tell the difference after two years of working together. “Sorry,” Brendon mumbles, dampened. “I’ll just. I’ll clean it up.”
Jon gives Ryan a look, and this one comes through loud and clear.
“Don’t,” he hastens to say, biting his lip at Jon. “I like it. Saw something just like it in a magazine last week. What are we doing?”
“I’m singing,” Jon says. He uses one hand to lift the guitar off of his knees and the other to pluck at Brendon’s sweater and pull him away from the floor where he’s hastily gathering papers. “I wanted to do something for Spencer. At the reception. So we’re finding the perfect song and I’m going to play the guitar and sing it.”
“I didn’t know you could sing,” Ryan says.
Brendon, who Ryan now notices is wearing a long-sleeved paisley shirt under a short sleeved green sweater, hastily switches his attention to the papers on the seat beside him. And grins. Really hard. “He can’t,” he crows. “It’s amazing. He can only hold about a quarter of a tune. Spencer’s going to love it.”
He pats the seat and scoots over until his knees are bumping Jon’s guitar. It leaves just enough room on the loveseat for a teacup. Ryan squeezes in anyway, and when he takes the papers from Brendon’s hands he sees that it’s sheet music. All of it. He trails his fingers down the page, lingering on a note or two, absently humming the tune under his breath. The one on top is ‘Pour Some Sugar On Me’ which isn’t really romantic, as far as, you know, romance goes. “Does Spencer know that you’re introducing food-kink to the ceremony?”
“The reception,” Jon corrects, smiling. “And no. It‘s a surprise. And we’re not doing that song, Brendon just wanted me to play it so he could sing it.” At this he smiles at Brendon, so warmly that Ryan expects Brendon‘s hair to just go ahead and ruffle itself. “Brendon can really sing.”
“I really can,” Brendon agrees. “I would be an amazing wedding singer. If you ever fire me, I’m totally going to be a wedding singer.”
The other songs are a lot more appropriate. There’s a healthy dose of Disney though, so Brendon’s influence is pretty obvious. “I’m not going to fire you,” he says idly. “This is a really beautiful idea. Whose was it?”
“Brendon’s.” There’s something significant in Jon’s voice. Ryan looks up in time to catch him jerking his eyes back down to the guitar. He strums a few chords, Brendon's eyes are glued to the carpet, and Ryan has the distinct impression that he’s missing something.
Of course, Ryan’s had the impression that he’s been missing a lot of things since the first time he saw Jon and Spencer smile at each other like the rest of the world had ceased to exist, so.
He clears his throat and tries again. “What are we leaning toward?”
“Counting Crows,” Brendon answers. “Omaha.”
“Or Accidentally In Love,” Jon chimes in. “But probably…” He strums a few chords and sings softly, mostly under his breath, “Come up through the summer rain, start turning the girl into the ground, roll a new love over.” His voice isn’t great, but his fingers are sure on the strings. He sings with his head bowed and his eyes closed, something throaty and plaintive echoing in the words. It wraps around Ryan’s heart and squeezes. Tight.
He clears his throat and nods. It’s a little vacant, he knows, but there’s heat spreading through his body, lingering in the places where he’s pressed up against Brendon. Maybe this is why he never does gay weddings. Doesn’t really want to see what he’s missing. “Um. Spence really loves Counting Crows. I think I know every word to August and Everything After by now.”
“Ohmygod, Jon,” Brendon interrupts, hushed but excited. “Fucking Aqualung, man. Fucking Brighter Than Sunshine.”
Ryan knows the words to that one too. He just doesn’t really like to think about them.
***
After long weeks of Brendon chattering away with a reporter from Out -- Mark is the name, Ryan thinks -- and even longer weeks of Brendon wheedling Ryan into it, they come to an agreement. The magazine will do a small feature on Ryan.
“We’d like to come photograph the ceremony,” Mark says during one of the rare times that Brendon lets him and Ryan speak on the phone.
“Why that one?” Ryan asks. “Why Spencer and Jon? I do lots of weddings.” He’s not just thinking of his desire to stay out of the gay weddings arena for once. He’s also remembering the look that Spencer gave Jon when Brendon first mentioned the idea. They’d looked hesitant and the agreement had come slowly; Ryan doesn’t want them to feel uncomfortable at their wedding just because they’ve decided to befriend him. After everything they’ve given him, the last thing he wants to do is take something like that away from them.
But Mark has a bunch of reasons. Things about how if there happens to be a gay wedding happening in the right time frame, they might as well feature that one, since it will be more relevant to their audience.
“Ok,” Ryan says finally. “But only the ceremony. And only from a distance, my first priority is maintaining the privacy of my clients. And no photographers at the reception.” He knows that he’s being a PR nightmare, but some things are just more important. Or should be.
And the absolute last thing he wants to do with only two days left until Spencer’s wedding is take part in a photoshoot, but that’s when Mark schedules it. “I have things to do,” he complains to Brendon. “I can’t just sit here for six hours and let people powder my nose. I have to make sure they get the flowers right. And the cake! All those layers, Bren, I can’t let them fuck up Spencer’s cake.”
Brendon arranges for the photographer to follow Ryan around for the day, taking shots at each vendor. The dry cleaner, the bakery, the florist, the caterers, the somewhat less glamorous rental location for the tables and chairs. And then he comes over in the morning to ‘help’ Ryan pick out his clothes. Mostly this involves sprawling across Ryan’s bed and watching him put things on.
Suits and shirts with ties and a light-weight knit sweater and everything feels either too fussy, too gay, or not gay enough. “You need to calm down,” Brendon says. “Seriously. Everything looks great on you. You get dressed every single day and look fantastic. It’s just another day.”
Brendon is wrong. Can’t he see that the sleeves on this jacket are too short? And that the striping on the shirt is all wrong and it makes Ryan look jaundiced? “I don’t even know why I agreed to this,” he mumbles. “It’s a really bad idea.”
“It’s a great idea.” There’s the protest of Ryan’s mattress springs and then the brush of Brendon behind him, his hands on Ryan’s shoulders. “Now this, this is a not so great jacket. Don’t confuse the two.”
Ryan obediently rolls his shoulders back and lets his arms hang limp so Brendon can strip the jacket off of him. And this? This is a bad idea. Brendon’s hands are gentle and sure, deftly putting the jacket back on the hanger and stowing it in the closet. Ryan can’t stop staring at the place where Brendon’s fingers are reflected in the mirror.
“I’m not nervous,” Ryan says, in the manner of someone volunteering information that is very obviously a lie. Brendon hands him a sweater vest- tone on tone argyle that works beautifully with his shirt. It’s jerked carelessly over his head in a matter of seconds, and Ryan’s back to squinting at the mirror. “I just don’t. You know.”
“I know,” Brendon says. His face is smooth in the way it gets when he’s focusing, exactly the same as it is in the photograph hanging in Ryan’s living room. He tucks his thumbs under the knitted edges of the garment Ryan’s so haphazardly donned, carefully lining them up with the seams of Ryan’s shirt. His palms flatten and smooth the fabric down the front, sliding under to straighten the crisp cotton beneath.
Ryan can’t breathe.
Brendon won’t make eye contact.
“These pants are all wrong,” Ryan says stupidly. “I think. Another shade.” He holds his breath while Brendon’s fingers slip down, catching every so often on the buttons of his shirt. He feels dizzy, hollowed out, and Brendon’s so still. Motionless but for the slow downward slide of his fingers. They hit Ryan’s belt, skim across the top edge of the leather.
And then stop. Brendon takes a deep breath and a step backward, but he catches Ryan’s gaze for the first time and his eyes are burning. “I’ll get another pair,” he says, and the very levelness of his voice is a tell. “What color?”
***
At first, the only reason Ryan kept Brendon around during non-wedding times was because of the way he was when they were actually at a wedding. He has this way of charming the crowd; crotchety grandmothers and bitter older cousins are no match for Brendon’s quick hands and bright smile. Brendon can convince the bride’s Cuban mother that the food really is better left until after the ceremony, all while flirting so outrageously that the woman is left blushing when he leads her to her seat. He can convince the jockiest of jocks to put down their beers and settle themselves primly into the tiny white folding chairs.
Ryan’s not so great at that part. He’s usually got about a dozen plates in the air, all spinning, and he doesn’t have time to smooth feathers and calm nerves. Other than the bride’s. The bride is always plate one, the biggest and fastest spinning of them all.
This is maybe the first wedding where Brendon’s quiet competence is more distracting than it is helpful. Ryan keeps catching glimpses out of the corner of his eye: Brendon greeting guests in his pin-striped trousers and t-shirt, Brendon sampling the appetizers with his eyes closed and his head tilted back, Brendon whispering furiously at the DJ when he tries to lay his cords right across the aisle.
And this, at Ryan’s side, leaning in while Spencer and Jon say their vows. Always this, they always watch the actual wedding together. Ryan usually cries. Sometimes out of relief that he’s done with the whole fucking family, sometimes because the ceremony is so beautiful, sometimes just because the bridesmaids are. This time it’s because he’s gut happy for Jon and Spencer, and his tears come from the tight knot in his ribcage instead of the corners of his eyes like they usually do.
Brendon’s hand finds Ryan’s when Jon’s steady voice says “I doooooo.” Spencer is laughing with the sun caught in his hair and Jon fucks off all of the choreography to lift Spencer’s hand to his face and kiss his knuckles. It cues something he’s never felt at any of his weddings: a sharp stab of envy as strong as the earlier one of joy. He laces his fingers with Brendon’s, unthinking, and squeezes.
Later, at the reception, Spencer drags him over to the table he and Jon have claimed (they eschewed the idea of a traditional wedding party dais) and forces him to sit. “I’ve got- I should watch,” Ryan protests.
“You’re fired,” Spencer answers cheerfully. “Sit. I’m married. You have to let me try to fix you up with the other wedding guests.”
He sits, and he actually gets to stay sitting. Brendon’s there too, on Jon’s other side, but he keeps darting up and away so that Ryan can stay in his chair and laugh with Spencer. The last time he darts away, it’s so that he can go to the front and claim the microphone.
“Ahem,” he says, head tilted enough that Ryan can just catch the corner of his grin from behind the mic. Spencer turns, surprised. They’d agreed to no speeches and he has no idea that Jon’s singing, so. “We have a special musical guest,” Brendon says. He has Jon’s guitar in his hand and he’s dragged up a tall stool. Ryan has butterflies in his stomach. “Jon Walker. Your presence is requested on stage one.”
“What?” Spencer asks faintly. He’s clinging to Jon’s hand, his long fingers tangled with Jon’s thicker ones, and his eyes are wide and a little shiny. “What?”
Jon extricates with a kiss and makes his way to the front; Ryan can read the pace of his step and the tense shake of his shoulders. He’s nervous. Hell, Ryan’s nervous, and this has nothing to do with him.
Spencer turns to Ryan and echoes the question. “What?”
“Shhhh.” He wraps his hand around the ball of Spencer’s shoulder and nods his chin toward the stage. “Just watch.”
“Um. Spence.” Jon’s ears are red. His voice is thick. Ryan wants to cry again. “You make me really happy, Spencer James Smith Walker Furbush the Fifth. The least I can do is humiliate myself in public for you, so.” His fingers find the strings and stroke. Ryan’s eyes find Brendon, who’s hovering off to the side wringing his hands.
The crowd pretty much hushes while Jon sings, though there’s the occasional loud sniffle and a cat-call or two when Jon’s voice cracks on one of the verses. Spencer’s face is incandescent, and if Ryan were any sort of wedding planner he’d get up and make sure a camera is pointed at it, but he can’t budge from his seat and the endless visual rotation of Jon, singing for Spencer, Spencer, beaming at Jon, and Brendon, whose eyes are either burning into Ryan’s neck or watching Spencer.
Absolutely no one averts their eyes when the song ends and Jon comes back to the table to bend over Spencer and kiss him. It’s intimate and hungry and every eye in the place is glued to them, longing. Ryan thinks he even hears Spencer’s mom sigh. They break apart, Spencer’s hands on Jon’s chest, Jon’s mouth by his ear. Ryan can see Jon’s lips moving, but he can’t hear the words.
It’s time for cake though. Fired or not fired, Ryan has things to do, he has to- why is Jon going back to the stage? It’s Ryan’s turn to blink stupidly when Jon bends toward the microphone and says, “I’d ask you to bear with us for one more musical number, but… it’s our wedding. So you’ll do what we want, right?”
Wait. Another musical number? Ryan doesn’t know anything about another musical number. “What?” He says, an unconscious if spot-on impression of Spencer from five minutes ago.
“Shhhh,” Spencer says back. He’s turned his chair and taken Ryan’s hands, and he’s looking at him like they’re about to jump off of a cliff together. Ryan can read the Are you ready for this? in Spencer’s eyes.
When he looks back toward Jon, the stool is to the side and Brendon is in front of the microphone looking like he’s about to die. “Hi,” he says, his voice weak this time. “I’d like to. This song is.” He laughs self consciously and turns to Jon, shrugging. “Isn’t love grand, you guys?”
Jon’s hands move on the guitar again, but this time it’s Brendon who sings, and there’s absolutely no doubt who he’s looking at. “Well I know it’s kind of late,” he starts. The tune is familiar, and after years of Brendon singing his way through the day, the voice should be too. It’s not. It’s husky. Hopeful. Brendon has one hand pressed to his stomach like he’s afraid something’s going to break out of his bellybutton, and the other is wrapped around the microphone, white knuckled. “I hope I didn’t wake you. What I gotta say can’t wait, I know you’d understand.”
Oh, God. Ryan knows this song. His fingers tighten on Spencer’s, and though he can feel Spencer’s smile warming his cheek he can’t see it. The whole world has narrowed down to Brendon leaning into the microphone stand, singing. “’Cause every time I tried to tell you, the words just came out wrong. So I have to say I love you in a song.”
It’s short, the song is short, thank God, because if it was any longer Ryan would probably be passed out by the end of it. As it is, he’s barely managing shallow, tremulous breaths when Brendon’s voice fades away.
Jon leans the guitar against the stool, but that happens somewhere in the corner of Ryan’s awareness, because Brendon has stepped to the side and is staring at Ryan with his whole fucking heart in his eyes. And that look. Ryan knows that look. Ryan’s seen that look at least three times a week every week for the last two and a half years of his life, but he never knew it was- God.
“Um,” Spencer says in his ear. “Are you going to go kiss him, or have you suffered some sort of permanent brain damage that I don’t know about?”
“I,” Ryan starts. “Um. It’s your wedding, Spence. I don’t-”
“Shut the fuck up,” Spencer says, and his hands shift and shove Ryan out of his chair. “Get your ass over there.”
It’s thirteen feet from his chair to Brendon. It feels like a single step. “Bren,” he says, but he can’t find the right path from that familiar syllable to any place where his heart won’t feel like it’s exploding, so he cups his hands around the back of Brendon’s neck and kisses him instead.
Author adellyna
Pairing Ryan/Brendon, Jon/Spencer
Ratings R(ish) for language
Summary Ryan plans weddings! Just not gay weddings. Ok, maybe just this once.
Disclaimer Nobody thinks this is real. Please don’t try to convince a judge otherwise.
Author’s Note Ok, this was supposed to be cracked out, with two-dimensional!bitchy!Ryan, and instead it’s… this. Whoops.
“No.” Ryan Ross doesn’t have time for this. It’s not even on his schedule, actually, and he barely has time for the things that are on it: the doggy spa for his Pomeranian (Pete), a mani/pedi at the people spa next door, eleven minutes at the newsstand picking up his favorites, a dress fitting with Brad Pitt’s cousin, the list goes on and on. Nowhere on it is ‘plan a gay wedding.’ “I don’t do gays,” he says, ignoring the fact that he is gay and does do gays all the time. “Nobody wears a dress, Brendon. I can’t plan a wedding without the dress. My firm is called Traditional Elegance for a reason, you know.”
This is the thirteenth gay couple Ryan has rejected in the last seven months though, and Brendon keeps saying he’s afraid that Out magazine is literally going to turn on them any minute now, snarling like a pack of ravening wolves. Ryan says Brendon should know, since he was apparently raised by just that sort.
“They’re really nice,” Brendon says soothingly. He’s fidgeting like he’d rather bubble and enthuse, but Ryan made him go to a voice coach to learn how to speak melodically. There's just no place for shrieking in their offices; the only shrillness Ryan will tolerate is from Pete or one of his brides.
Ryan brushes a microscopic bit of lint off his lapel (Brendon is pretty sure that the lint, in Ryan’s mind at least, looks exactly like two men in tuxedos) and glances disinterestedly at the folder in Brendon’s hand. “Nice is great, really. Is one of them nice and a woman?”
“Well, no. But one of them is pretty like a girl.”
“Pretty enough to wear a wedding gown, maybe?” Ryan also turns down weddings that would take place on water-skis, in the midst of something tacky like sky-diving or, worse, hanging oneself from hooks and body piercings. Additionally, if the bride is ugly. Ryan absolutely cannot abide an unattractive bride. What would that even look like in his portfolio?
Brendon just opens the folder to the photo of the couple and taps his forefinger above their smiling faces. And, ok, they’re both exceptionally attractive and, when he looks close, the prettier one appears to be wearing girl’s jeans. Ryan can maybe, maybe work with this. “I can maybe work with this,” he admits grudgingly. “But I’m not committing. They have to come in for a prospective client interview. And if that goes well, I have to go to their house, and if I spot a single piece of rainbow paraphernalia, I am getting a restraining order.”
***
The first meeting goes well and the home visit even better. Jon and Spencer’s house is tastefully decorated with a mix of woods and fabrics that are durable but also beautiful. Ryan thinks Jon looks durable but also beautiful, though it’s Spencer who really catches his fancy. Spencer glows with good grooming and inner bitchiness. He’s like a hand-embroidered, raw silk throw pillow, all buffed nails and carefully coordinated clothes. Ryan wants to steal him away and buy him a little carrying case like Pete’s and put little shirts on him. A sweater vest, maybe.
Even better, neither Jon nor Spencer does anything on the list of Things You May Do In A Trailer Park, But Not In The Presence of Ryan Ross. Things like calling each other Poopsie and Snickerdoodle or playing foot-wrestling games or mentioning any poor and/or mentally ill relations. Food items are served looking as though they’ve never come in contact with disposable dishware, the tea is perfect and English, and when Pete humps Jon’s leg, Jon just laughs softly and scratches him between the ears.
Ryan beams proudly and places his teacup into its saucer with a delicate clink, easing the whole set onto the (antique, if he’s not mistaken) table next to him. “There are just a few questions I need to get out of the way,” he says serenely. “Most of them I’d like to discuss with the two of you as a couple, but there is an important query or two I need to make of you individually, so Jon, if you’ll excuse us?” He says it regally, as though it’s perfectly acceptable to dismiss a man from his own home, and Jon stands without a fuss. Ryan could kiss Jon Walker. He’s the perfect groom.
When he and Spencer are alone, Ryan curves his palms around the arms of his chair and smiles warmly. “Spencer,” he says. “Have we ever slept together?”
“Pardon me?”
It’s an important question, really; the awkwardness that ensues when one of the happy couple realizes that they have, at some point in their past, fucked the wedding planner? It’s not a pretty sight. It happened to Ryan just two years ago, the dawning realization that he and the groom had had a one-night stand during the groom’s experimental college years. The bonus check at the end had been more than enough to ensure his silence, but the tenseness had given him three gray hairs. Three. He took a six week series of scalp massage from two very skilled Moroccan ex-harem girls, and he’s pretty sure they’ve moved on from that nightmare, but it never hurts to be careful.
“It’s not that I don’t think you’d be memorable, Spencer,” he says kindly, “but my younger years were a whirlwind of bright lights and pretty boys, so. If you could just put my mind at ease, we can move on to talking about things like themes and centerpieces.”
Spencer smiles sweetly back at him and speaks with a wryly bitchy tone that warms Ryan’s heart. “It’s safe to say I haven’t had the pleasure, Ryan.”
Questioning Jon yields a similar result, only with pink-tipped ears and adorable head ducking and Spencer and Jon are officially Ryan’s favorite couple yet. And Ryan did the wedding of Miss Georgia and her darling Junior Senator fiancé, so that’s saying a lot. Oh, the crinoline. He’ll just have to do a beauty queen wedding after this one, to make up for the shameful lack of a gown.
“So,” he says brightly when he’s got them both seated across from him again. They’re holding hands, Jon’s thumb sweeping steadily across Spencer’s knuckles. The whole house smells like the cinnamonny perfection Jon seems to have slipped into the oven while Ryan was questioning Spencer and Pete’s claimed a spot with his rump in Spencer’s lap and his head on Jon’s thigh. “So,” he repeats, “I’ve never done a gay wedding before. Which one of you is the bride?”
Jon and Spencer exchange an intimate glance that makes Ryan’s toes curl from all the way across the (sublime, tufted, chocolate velvet) ottoman. Spencer strokes skritching fingers down Pete’s back and does that lip quirking thing that Ryan is learning to associate with oncoming bitchery. “We’re both men,” he drawls. “We thought you understood…”
Spencer is Ryan’s favorite person ever. He wonders if Jon would notice if Ryan gave Brendon better hair (Spencer’s hair) and switched them out.
“So it’s obviously you, then. The grooms never talk back like that.” What he really wants to say is ‘where have you been all my life, Spencer Smith, and how familiar are you with organic cuisine?’
***
Ryan calls the office on his way back to give Brendon the good news. Also, to make sure Brendon knows to pick up his dry-cleaning, check the supply of dog poo bags, and to pull the venue list and have it waiting on his desk, but he opens with their acceptance of the Walker-Smith wedding. It’s enough to make Brendon seem really happy about plastic baggies that will inevitably contain dog shit though, and that might even make Ryan - safe in the privacy of his car - crack a smile.
When he makes it back and steps into the cool, empty lobby, the phone is off the hook and Brendon is nowhere to be seen, though there are cheerful shuffling noises coming from the supply closet. It used to be way worse than this, Brendon used to do his victory dance in the middle of the lobby. Once (the last time it ever happened), he’d bopped right into someone’s grandmother’s lap. In her wheelchair. From that moment on, Ryan had banished Brendon’s interpretive and/or celebratory dance numbers to confined spaces. Like the supply closet. Or the bathroom. Or, best of all, Brendon’s own house.
There’s a muffled thump, the tinkling of hundreds of paperclips raining onto the terrazzo tile, and what sounds awfully like Brendon’s elbow colliding with the door. Ryan gently replaces the phone on its hook and hops up onto the corner of Brendon’s desk. The venue file is on it, open, and Brendon’s already started flagging information sheets. There’s one for the park that’s about an hour away- a really gorgeous place with massive trees and beautifully dappled light. The Post It attached to this one says ‘gay guys love nature and shit!’ in Brendon’s round, happy scrawl.
When they’d gone to scout the location, Brendon had packed a picnic lunch. He’d spread the blanket on the ground near the lake, fussed with it until it was smooth, even brought regular silverware because he knows how much Ryan hates the fake stuff. Ryan had wandered, photographing the angles and the way the light melts across the surface of the lake, the way the trees thin and finally relent, giving way to the open clearing that wraps around and embraces the water. A number of these photographs are framed and hang in a long, straight row in Brendon’s living room. The one of Brendon laying careful place settings, his face smooth and intent, hangs in Ryan’s.
There'd been so many assistants before Brendon. If Ryan has it his way, there won't be any after, though he might be getting Brendon one, if their business keeps growing this way.
He hears the door swing open and glances over his shoulder at it. The doorway is empty, and Ryan cocks his head to the side. “Bren?”
“Here! I’m here!” Brendon’s voice is muffled. Ryan has to lean over and look down to see Brendon on his hands and knees, gathering paperclips and shoving them back into the box. They won’t fit, Ryan knows. You can’t put a full box of paper clips back to rights once they’ve been spilled. They’re like secrets in that way.
Brendon’s got the last of them in his clenched fist, trying to cram them back into the box, which is already bulging at the seams. “I need some more of those in my office,” Ryan says idly, “if you don’t mind.”
He hears the creak of Brendon’s shoes as he sits up onto his haunches, catches the thumbing of glasses back into place from the corner of his eye. “No,” Brendon says, and there’s the note of vague relief that Ryan hears whenever a minor catastrophe is averted. In other words, at least twice a day. “No problem. I’ll go do that now- oh, you found the venue file! And there’s a message for you. Out magazine called.”
“Called?” Ryan fans the top flap of the file with his thumb, angling his chin up to protect his hair from the vague breeze it generates. “Why would they call?”
“Well. I guess technically they called back.”
Sigh. This was to be the exception, not the rule. Spencer and Jon are great, it’s true, and Brendon’s instincts about people are usually pretty spot on, but Ryan doesn’t want to be the city’s premiere gay wedding planner. He loves the glamour of a traditional, heterosexual wedding. He loves the aisle and the wedding march and the dress and the veil and the headpieces. Oh, the headpieces, with pearls and crystal. Ryan loves going with the bride to the beauty salon and helping her pick a hair style. He loves being invited to bachelorette parties and helping the bridesmaids dye their shoes. He loves the way the bride’s father looks when they walk down the aisle together, he loves the pomp and the ceremony. And even though he’s possibly the least religious person ever, he likes church weddings with priests. For his last really religious couple, they got the church choir to do the wedding march a capella. Ryan may have cried. A little. Really, really little.
“Brendon,” he says, sighing. “Bren. I’m doing this wedding because I really like Spencer. And Jon. But I don’t want every gay in town beating down my doors looking for a commitment ceremony.”
“A really beautiful commitment ceremony,” Brendon corrects guilelessly.
That’s beside the point though. Ryan snaps the venue file shut and tries to look stern, even if he’s quite pleased. “I know. But seriously, Brendon, I want to plan weddings. Regular weddings with one bride and one groom. I could plan bar mitzvahs too, but I don’t want to, ok?”
“Ok, fine.” Brendon’s head bows, his glasses slide off a little, and he pokes at a few stray paperclips, seemingly gathering his nerve the same way. “But. Ok, it’s just that you’re really amazing at this, Ryan. And you’re gay, so even if we never do another gay wedding again, I don’t see why it’s so wrong for you to be recognized. For your talent.”
The office is quiet. The fan whirs overhead, the copier huffs and settles in to sleep, water trickles down the fountain in the corner, but neither Ryan nor Brendon say anything.
“I’ll talk to them,” Ryan says finally. “But I’m not promising anything.”
***
He finally settles on a handful of locations to show Jon and Spencer. With a lot of couples, you can take just one person to see them. Usually the bride, since grooms are notoriously inclined to either agree to the first just to get it over with or to be too afraid of the bride’s wrath to agree to any.
It’s a little different with these two. Jon says, “It’s beautiful, but I would want Spence to see it before I made a decision” to all but one of the locations. At the last location he takes one look at the busy hotel bar in the lobby, the way the room’s windows overlook the second bar by the pool and says, very simply, “No.”
Spencer is more likely to pick everything apart. “It’s nice, I guess, but we’d prefer something with hardwood floors, if we’re going to be inside.” “I like that it’s outside, but I don’t want the tents to look like they’re floating. There aren’t enough trees.” “I don’t like the manager here. I’m pretty sure he had a mullet.”
Finally Ryan realizes he has to take them both or they’re never going to make a decision. He’s managed to cobble together a rough list of places he thinks will meet both of their needs; the last of these is the park Brendon had earmarked from the start.
They meet at Ryan’s office on a Saturday and pack into Jon’s hybrid. “Jon likes to drive,” Spencer says. “And he doesn’t get to, not often. Do you mind?” Ryan does mind, actually, and if it was Jon making the request, he would probably say no. You can’t say no to your brides though, that’s Ryan’s first rule.
Brendon climbs into the front seat to navigate for Jon and Ryan finds himself in the back with Spencer. There’s a little cooler in the space between their feet; it’s not Styrofoam, and Ryan has the sudden happy flash of these two driving hours and hours to spend a single night on the shore, getting in at sunset to kick their feet in the foam where it exhales against the sand and then washes back out again. For the first time in his years of planning weddings, he thinks he might like to get married.
“Where’s Pete?” Jon asks, the car in gear, the turn signal on, his brow screwed up in confusion.
“Oh,” Ryan says. “I left him at home. We’ll be driving most of the day and I didn’t want to add to your stress.”
Spencer clicks his seatbelt closed. It makes a firm, decisive sound and he nods to match it. “That’s silly. We love Pete. Where do you live? Let’s go get him.”
Brendon navigates the scant few miles between Ryan’s apartment and the office, chattering constantly. He never misses a turn though, always interrupting his story of how they got Pete, “From this guy I knew through a friend of mine and Ryan wanted a puppy. Well, he needed a puppy, he works too much and I don’t think his TV is even plugged in so it’s always too quiet in his apartment. But anyway, we got to the place and the guy, like, man, he did not treat his dogs well, like, at all. And there was this one that was littler than the others and his coloring wasn’t really right and the guy was really mean to the dog, like, he kept trying to shut it in this tiny cage and it kept barking but really quiet and I thought maybe the guy wasn’t feeding it as much or something, and Ryan asked how much for the one in the cage and the guy said he wasn’t selling that one because his papers weren’t ready which was obviously a total lie - turn left at the light - because the guy was just shady, right? But anyway - second right up there and then it’s the first building, the green one - Ryan ended up paying, like, 50% extra for the runt of the litter. He turned out to be, well, he’s Pete though, right? So we got the better end of the bargain. Oh, and then we called the ASPCA on that fu- guy’s ass, so.”
Ryan’s relieved when they pull up in front of his apartment, he can hand his keys over to Brendon and try to ignore the way that Spencer’s smirking at him. Like he has some sort of marshmallow filling and needs the words ‘puppy champion’ printed on his business cards. It’s bullshit. He just wanted a little dog. Everyone likes little dogs these days, they‘re trendy. Plus, that cage was really small. And the guy was really shady. And fine, maybe Ryan doesn’t like it when the underdog gets pushed even further under. It’s just not right.
“So,” he says, clearing his throat. “Three places. I’ve got three. Two are outdoors, the third is a really nice old plantation style house with a massive wrap-around porch, so it could easily be an indoor/outdoor wedding there, if it strikes your fancy. The first outdoor one is a large public garden. There’s a lot of color this time of year, so that’s nice, but I think it might be a little too confined for your taste. The second outdoor one is a park about an hour away.” For many reasons that far exceed Brendon’s original note of ‘gay guys love nature and shit’, Ryan believes this will be the place they choose.
Brendon tumbles back into the car with a wheeze and a grin, Pete scrambling for footing against his scrawny little legs. “Oh, I love that place. You guys are going to love that place.”
***
There’s something about Spencer and Jon that turns off every painstakingly installed filter in Brendon’s brain. Ryan gets the distinct impression that these three will be friends long after the caterers pack up and all the thank you cards are sent.
He’s a little lonely, when everyone climbs out of the car at the park; even though it’s not fair to be. He’s hung back with his folder, Spencer has Pete in his arms, Brendon is gesticulating excitedly toward the benches with the flowers growing up the sides, the winding path through the woods. “Ryan said something about flower petals all along here,” he’s saying, voice fading. “He wants to do everything organic or biodegradable.”
“Hey,” Spencer says. It startles Ryan, he almost drops his notes when he looks up. Spencer had been off with Jon, right? And Jon was following in the wake of Brendon, so.
“Hey,” Ryan says back. “I’m coming, I promise, I printed the weather reports for the last ten years for the week you want, and I wanted to pull them so we could see what we could maybe expect. Also, I’ve got a photocopy of the Farmer’s Almanac for predictions for this year.”
Spencer closes the binder and takes it from Ryan, pressing it to his chest. “We can do all that later.” He falls silent then, his head turned toward the trees where they can still catch flashes of Brendon, his pink hoodie darting from tree to tree. Jon’s harder to spot, in dark blue and moving slower. “It’s really beautiful here,” Spencer says. “Thanks. For finding it. And for doing this, I know you had some reservations.”
“Oh.” He doesn’t really know what to say. Usually the thank you comes in the form of a hastily scribbled card a week or two after the wedding. Never this, never someone leaning quietly against the car next to him, squinting into the sun, shoulders brushing. He doesn’t get the feeling that Spencer is coming onto him - if he did, he’d quit on the spot - but he does feel like he’s being offered something. Whatever it is that Brendon strikes up with people on the first meeting. Friendship, maybe. “I’m happy to,” he says carefully. “Love should be celebrated.”
Brendon’s laugh floats across to them; it’s not all that far to the lake, it’s just that the thick belt of trees makes you feel isolated once you get there. “Sure,” Spencer says, his smile careless and free. “That, and you totally think Jon has a great ass. It’s ok, he does, and the truth, Ryan, the truth should always be celebrated.”
Ryan’s binder is on the front seat and the door locked before he even knows what’s happening.
“I need that,” he says, fingertips pressed to the window.
Spencer tucks his arm through Ryan’s and shakes his head. “Nope. You don’t need notes to feel the ambiance of the place. Anyway, I’m the bride, and I demand that you look at pretty flowers with me without taking a single note. And, if my suspicions are correct, help me get Brendon out of the tree he’ll inevitably but oh-so-unwisely climb.”
***
Ryan’s phone rings on a Wednesday at nine in the morning. It’s Spencer’s number on the display and Ryan has to actually stop and look at it, trying to figure out how to answer. Spencer’s called every day since they found the right location, sometimes with actual questions but sometimes just to make insane suggestions until Ryan finds himself laughing helplessly.
“I’ve been thinking that maybe we should have a space themed wedding,” he’d said yesterday. Ryan could hear clacking in the background, water running. He was pretty sure Spencer was doing dishes. “Like, we’ll wear space suits and fake an anti-grav walk down the aisle. All the guests will get little alien antennae to wear and the cake can be in the shape of a flying saucer. What do you think?”
On Saturday he’d called with an ‘emergency’ that ‘absolutely necessitated’ Ryan meeting him at the Starbucks two blocks from the office. No, he couldn’t elaborate, it was too urgent, no time. When Ryan showed up, Spencer was curled into one of the corner armchairs with a book and a hot chocolate. “What,” Ryan said, trying to keep calm. “Is everyone ok? Injured? Are you alright?”
“Everyone’s in good health,” he said. “But I’m trying to do the crossword in today’s paper and I can’t for the life of me come up with a ten letter word for ‘mountain system.’”
Ryan’s disbelieving look had been met with one of such angelic innocence that he’d had to blink. “It’s giving me wrinkles,” Spencer had said. “I can’t have wrinkles on my wedding day. It’ll ruin the pictures.”
So usually Ryan would answer the phone with “Ryan Ross,” but he’s not sure that’s appropriate anymore. Just “Ryan” seems really weird, so.
“Hey,” is what he ends up saying, when he realizes the phone’s been ringing forever and it’ll go to voicemail soon.
Spencer says “Hey,” back, and Ryan can sort of tell that he’s smiling. Apparently he did something right back at the park and took Spencer Smith up on what he was offering. Ryan can’t find it in his heart to regret it, whatever it was.
“No cowboy weddings either,” Ryan says. “Brendon will insist that Jon learns how to lasso so he can rope you and drag you down the aisle and Spencer, I can’t call my attorney and ask him to draft a waiver for that sort of thing, ok?”
His door swings open, like, immediately. Brendon pops his head in, beaming (note to self: get office soundproofed). “I think that’s a great idea, actually,” he says. “Let me get Jon on the phone, he’ll love it.”
Spencer laughs on the other end of the phone. It’s pretty much the definition of infectious, so Ryan’s laughing too, right through wadding up a piece of paper and throwing it at Brendon’s retreating head. “No,” Spencer says. “I’m just wondering when my dress fitting is. I mean, I know there’s not an actual dress, but I am going to be wearing something, right?”
“God, I hope so.” Ryan realizes he’s smiling stupidly at the phone, like Spencer can see him and smile back. His first impression was right after all, Spencer’s rapidly become Ryan’s favorite person in the world. He’s surprised to find that it twinges a little, trying to figure out if it’s really Spencer or Brendon who holds the title; Ryan hasn’t ever given a whole lot of thought to whether or not Brendon is important to him. It‘s something he‘s been trying not to dwell on, so he flips his calendar open and snags a pen. “I can mark you down for some shopping. In ink, even.”
“Oh, nice. I qualify for ink. When’s good?”
And the thing about Ryan’s schedule is that there really isn’t a ‘good’, every day is so packed. Most every appointment he makes is tentative, prone to shifting, but he wants to give Spencer something back for the daily phone calls, so. “I’m pretty free. When did you have in mind?”
“Tomorrow afternoon, maybe? Jon’s got a late meeting, so I’ll just be lonely and moping. And then eating, if you want to come over after.” Spencer pauses, Ryan fancies that he can hear traces of hesitation in his breath, in the way the background noise has stopped too. “You can bring Brendon,” he says casually. “If you like. We can pretend we’ve never heard the word wedding. Jon’s lasagna is to die for, and I can throw Texas Toast in the oven like nobody’s business.”
Ryan usually eats alone. Or he eats on dates. Sometimes he has business lunches where he networks. Then, of course, there are the times he takes his couples out for planning meals, but he’s always working then too. It’s pretty much never that he has an invitation to go to someone’s house and sit back and be served. “Um,” he says, which is another thing he does pretty much never. “That sounds, uh. Yeah. I mean, I’ll try to keep my schedule clear. Things come up, but I’ll definitely try.”
They hang up, and Ryan definitely doesn’t think about what Spencer was implying when he suggested that Ryan bring Brendon.
***
If someone had asked Ryan to write an essay on the exact opposite of wedding gown shopping, it would have fallen tragically short of his shopping trip with Spencer. Instead of seeking formal wear, Spencer tries to drag Ryan into Hot Topic and Forever 21. Ryan draws a hard line when he sees Spencer making eyes at Wet Seal; he considers it a victory.
“What were you thinking?” He says, when the mall doors swoosh open and welcome them to the bustling artificial winter. “Tuxedos? Suits? I think matching suits might be a little much, but unmatching suits would be tricky, so maybe-”
“Ooh,” Spencer interrupts, veering off toward an open doorway that’s spilling punk music into the hall. “Jeans!”
It’s going to be a long day.
Spencer is a shopping fiend. Like, Ryan thought he could get a lot done, but Spencer’s just a narrow, stylish blur whizzing from rack to rack. He ends up with four bags full and Ryan doesn’t even know what’s in them.
In a stroke of genius, he points Spencer toward a shoe store. “Oooooh,” Spencer says, eyes lighting up. “Shoes!”
They end up with a wall of shoeboxes stacked high around them, but at least Spencer has to sit still while he tries them on, so Ryan can get something done. “Spencer,” he says, prepping the pair of Keds with little whales on them. He’s pretty sure they’re girl shoes. He’s also pretty sure Spencer doesn’t care. “We do need to talk about what you’re going to wear, you know?”
“I know,” Spencer says, but he’s got his head tilted at his outstretched feet. “I think these shoes make my feet look small, right? But the glitter, Ryan, the glitter.”
With anybody else, Ryan would have a headache. All he has now is the desire to laugh his ass off and possibly mock Spencer for his glittery shoes. “I’ll make sure there’s plenty of glitter in the wedding, it’ll be positively dripping with fairy dust. You, on the other hand, will be naked.”
Spencer cocks an eyebrow at Ryan and snags the Keds. “Naked? Kinky. I think I should tell you that you’re not my type. Anyway, I already know part of what I’m wearing. I’ve still got the shirt I wore on my first date with Jon. I want to wear that.”
Now this, this Ryan can work with. “Ok,” he says, nodding. The next shoebox has Sketchers in them. Green. “Ok, what color is it? We can find a good tie to go with it, get you a nice black suit.”
“It’s pink,” Spencer says. “It has a bunch of ladybugs in the shape of a heart, and then one of them is crawling away.” He smiles, and it’s a secret, warm sort of smile that makes Ryan’s hands still on the laces he’s been fixing. Spencer’s fingers trace a little line from his stomach down to his hip and he says, dreamily, “Jon really liked that one. The one that got away.”
It’s sweet. Kind of a glimpse into their past, and Ryan’s gearing up to ask about the first date when the horrendous bombshell that Spencer dropped on him registers. “Wait. Wait. It’s a t-shirt?”
As it turns out, it is a t-shirt. It further turns out that Spencer actually does intend to wear jeans to the wedding. “But dark rinse,” he says earnestly. “Straight leg. Classy jeans!”
He agrees to a jacket, a dark grey number that Ryan layers over a lighter grey striped button up. These two over the pink shirt, with the dark jeans, and some sort of respectable shoe (Ryan plans to break into Spencer’s house and temporarily steal every shoe he owns that isn’t black), and it’s… well, it’s still the least weddingy outfit Ryan has ever seen worn to a wedding. And Spencer’s the bride for fuck’s sake.
It does look good though, he has to admit. Spencer puts it all on as soon as they get back, modeling, and it‘s very. It’s very Spencer. And because it’s so Spencer, Ryan realizes, it’s also very Jon.
“What’s Jon going to wear?” Ryan asks, as soon as his stomach stops fizzing.
Spencer shrugs, his hands smoothing the garments on their hangers. “Probably slacks and a button up. It’s kind of his default when it comes to dressing up.”
Which will work, actually. Ryan just needs to find slacks that will match Spencer’s jacket and a button up that will match Spencer’s t-shirt. And then, if he’s lucky, he can cajole Jon into wearing a tie of some sort and tada, the wedding will look like a wedding again. Sort of.
“Oh, hey, look.” Spencer’s unpacking things from his shopping bags, sorting by the care instructions so that he can pre-wash. How much does Ryan love that he pre-washes his garments? A lot. A whole lot.
He’s holding up a t-shirt. A really small t-shirt in a warm sort of amber color. Ryan can only see the back, but then Spencer turns it around and Ryan is confronted with. Well. They’re like rosettes, he thinks. But they’re smooshed mostly flat, so there’s just the faint texture of them, rising in a long, twisted mass that stretches down from the shoulder. It’s all warm, vibrant reds with deeper blacks and burgundies that fall in the shadows of the ridges. Actually, it’s gorgeous. “I got this for you,” Spencer says, carefully refolding the shirt. “Your wardrobe needs some frivolity.”
“Oh. Thanks.” It seems really inadequate. Just the one word, short, mostly consonants. Ryan feels kind of like he should make a speech. Or maybe hug Spencer. Is hugging too much?
“Shit. We forgot to put the lasagna in.”
***
It’s two in the morning and Ryan kind of wants to cry. He has a huge wedding the next day. Huge. One he’s been planning for months, one that’s taken up a good half of his working hours, one he’d thought he was completely prepared for. He’d thought that right up until seven o’clock when he’d been on his way home and the bride called. She’d been casual, but he’d heard her voice waver a time or two, so he wasn’t buying that shit for a minute. And she shouldn’t be casual. The couple had decided that, in lieu of gifts, they’d like people to make donations to the Make A Wish Foundation. All of the wedding invitations clearly stated that donation cards and envelopes would be made available at the reception.
The bride had promised Ryan that she was going to take care of all of this- she had a friend who was an artist, he was going to design the card, they’d bring them to the wedding already made out to each guest and with a personalized thank you card included, yada yada, etc etc. It had been kind of a stupid idea, if you asked Ryan, but he wasn’t going to be responsible for it, so whatever.
Eighteen hours before the ceremony starts, she tells Ryan that her friend has flaked and that they have neither the donation cards nor the envelopes. “They have to be personalized,” she says, verging on frantic now. “He gave me back all of the thank you cards, Ryan, but I’d already put names on all of them, Ryan.” Ryan’s turn signal is already on, he’s waiting to make a U-Turn.
That was seven hours ago. He’d gone straight back to the office, mocked up something in Photoshop, took it to Kinkos, picked up the (fucking personalized) Thank You cards from the bride’s house, and now he’s staring at four hundred envelopes that need to be marked with names and stuffed with Thank You cards. Four. Hundred.
He really wants to cry.
Brendon’s finally passed out in the lobby; Ryan doesn’t begrudge him the sleep, but there is no way he’s going to be able to get this done, even if he does wake Brendon up.
Instead of crying, he does the very first thing he can think to do when his throat is tight and his eyes are itchy and breathing is becoming kind of a tense situation: he calls Spencer.
His chest gets tighter while the phone rings, and it doesn’t loosen up until he hears Jon’s groggy voice on the other end. “Hello?”
“Hi,” Ryan says. “It’s Ryan. Ross. Ryan Ross. I’m so sorry to call you so late, really, I’m so sorry. Um.”
He hears muffled yawning and the slide of fabric on fabric, the distant sound of Jon deciding he’d rather hand the phone off to Spencer than listen to Ryan babble. “S’Ryan,” Jon says, and then Spencer’s on the phone saying his name.
“Yeah.” Suddenly, Ryan feels even more like crying, and he can’t figure out why he thought calling one of his clients in the middle of a night to panic was a good idea.
“Did you die?” Spencer asks. “Are you calling me from beyond the grave? Cuz you‘d better. I will be so pissed at you if you die and don‘t call to let me know.”
And he doesn’t sound angry, not at all. It makes Ryan break into thin, hysterical laughter, somewhere in the midst of which he starts relating the story. “- I have calligraphy pens,” he babbles, “but there’s four hundred envelopes. Spencer, what am I going to do? I can’t, there’s no way I can do all of these. I have to be at the venue in six hours to make sure the set up is going right and then I have to go to the limo place and then I have to-”
Spencer just talks over him. It starts with shushing, and when Ryan’s voice quiets but keeps going, Spencer starts talking more firmly. “I’ll be there in twenty,” he says, and Ryan starts to protest but he hears Jon say something in the background and then Spencer is back, talking even more loudly over him. “We’ll be there in twenty. Don’t argue.”
He doesn’t.
They show up, bleary but adorable, in pajama pants and t-shirts with hoodies hastily zipped over them. Jon has a smudge of toothpaste in the corner of his mouth. For the first time all night, Ryan doesn’t want to cry.
“I have bitchin’ penmanship,” Spencer says, tucking an arm around Ryan’s shoulders. “Lead me to your fine writing implements and high quality paper products and I shall write names so beautifully that you will weep from the artistry of it.”
“I make bitchin’ coffee,” Jon adds. He’s produced a bag of coffee beans from somewhere. Ryan doesn’t know where they came from and, quite frankly, he doesn’t care. It’s enough that Jon’s eyes are crinkling at the corners and that Brendon is stirring to the sounds of their voices and that Spencer’s at his desk cooing over the silver envelopes and that he’s not alone in the middle of the fucking night with this crisis on his hands.
Brendon, who’s too busy purring over the bag of beans to notice that his glasses are skewed and smudged, leads Jon to the coffee pot. Spencer’s just there. Being calm and Spencer-like, with his hands tucked in the pocket of his hoodie and his eyes squinted into a sleepy smile.
Two hours later, they’re so close to done that it makes Ryan want to cry again; in relief, this time. “Lissy Furbush,” Jon says. “Really? Furbush? That’s. I can’t even. Spence, please tell me we can change our names to Furbush? Jon and Spencer Furbush.”
“God, no,” Spencer retorts, his fingers careful on the o’s, quick to slash through the t’s. “The lesbians would never stop calling, Jon. It would be wall to wall lesbians all the time. They eat so much, we’d be broke in, like, a week.”
It’s been like this the whole time. Jon and Spencer mocking name after name. “Oh wow. We have to, have to, have to name our first born Xenoplin.”
“First born? Is there something you need to tell me?”
Brendon gets less done than anyone else, he’s too tired to do anything but laugh breathlessly at even the lamest jokes, but he does refill everyone’s coffee and even runs to the gas station down the street when Spencer declares that he cannot possibly write another name until he has powdered mini-donuts.
They leave the envelopes -- all four hundred of them, stuffed and personalized -- in Ryan’s trunk. “I’m sorry for calling,” Ryan muffles into the fierce hug that Spencer gives him at the end of the night. “But thank you for coming. Thank you so much.”
“Don’t be stupid,” Spencer says gently. “Of course we came. We’re your friends.”
He doesn’t get any sleep. Not really, not in the long run. They don’t finish until five; Ryan takes Brendon home with him because Brendon’s apartment is twenty minutes further away and he’s way too loopy to drive. Brendon passes out on the couch the minute his head hits the cushion, glasses still on, mouth open, his arm dangling off the side.
It’s. It’s just Brendon, really. Ryan’s fingers itch with the need to pull off the glasses, plump up a pillow, and tuck Brendon’s hand back to his chest. It takes everything he has to go to bed without doing it.
***
Two weeks before Jon and Spencer’s wedding, Ryan comes back to his office to discover that it’s been the site of a hurricane. Or possibly just Brendon. There’s paper everywhere, stacks of it piled on top of every semi-flat surface, single pieces strewn about the floor, the printer whirring and spitting out even more. “Um,” Ryan says, freezing with his toes overlapping the piece of paper that sticks out under the door. “What the hell?”
“Jon’s being romantic,” Brendon says happily.
Ryan kind of fails to see how trashing Traditional Elegance counts as romance. Unless, like, he and Brendon are running away together and Brendon’s always really wanted to stick one to the man. The man being Ryan, of course. “This is very romantic,” he says wryly. “God, I wish a man would make a huge mess for me.”
He catches a flash of something in Brendon’s eyes. It’s either longing or shame, and Ryan’s a little disturbed that he can’t tell the difference after two years of working together. “Sorry,” Brendon mumbles, dampened. “I’ll just. I’ll clean it up.”
Jon gives Ryan a look, and this one comes through loud and clear.
“Don’t,” he hastens to say, biting his lip at Jon. “I like it. Saw something just like it in a magazine last week. What are we doing?”
“I’m singing,” Jon says. He uses one hand to lift the guitar off of his knees and the other to pluck at Brendon’s sweater and pull him away from the floor where he’s hastily gathering papers. “I wanted to do something for Spencer. At the reception. So we’re finding the perfect song and I’m going to play the guitar and sing it.”
“I didn’t know you could sing,” Ryan says.
Brendon, who Ryan now notices is wearing a long-sleeved paisley shirt under a short sleeved green sweater, hastily switches his attention to the papers on the seat beside him. And grins. Really hard. “He can’t,” he crows. “It’s amazing. He can only hold about a quarter of a tune. Spencer’s going to love it.”
He pats the seat and scoots over until his knees are bumping Jon’s guitar. It leaves just enough room on the loveseat for a teacup. Ryan squeezes in anyway, and when he takes the papers from Brendon’s hands he sees that it’s sheet music. All of it. He trails his fingers down the page, lingering on a note or two, absently humming the tune under his breath. The one on top is ‘Pour Some Sugar On Me’ which isn’t really romantic, as far as, you know, romance goes. “Does Spencer know that you’re introducing food-kink to the ceremony?”
“The reception,” Jon corrects, smiling. “And no. It‘s a surprise. And we’re not doing that song, Brendon just wanted me to play it so he could sing it.” At this he smiles at Brendon, so warmly that Ryan expects Brendon‘s hair to just go ahead and ruffle itself. “Brendon can really sing.”
“I really can,” Brendon agrees. “I would be an amazing wedding singer. If you ever fire me, I’m totally going to be a wedding singer.”
The other songs are a lot more appropriate. There’s a healthy dose of Disney though, so Brendon’s influence is pretty obvious. “I’m not going to fire you,” he says idly. “This is a really beautiful idea. Whose was it?”
“Brendon’s.” There’s something significant in Jon’s voice. Ryan looks up in time to catch him jerking his eyes back down to the guitar. He strums a few chords, Brendon's eyes are glued to the carpet, and Ryan has the distinct impression that he’s missing something.
Of course, Ryan’s had the impression that he’s been missing a lot of things since the first time he saw Jon and Spencer smile at each other like the rest of the world had ceased to exist, so.
He clears his throat and tries again. “What are we leaning toward?”
“Counting Crows,” Brendon answers. “Omaha.”
“Or Accidentally In Love,” Jon chimes in. “But probably…” He strums a few chords and sings softly, mostly under his breath, “Come up through the summer rain, start turning the girl into the ground, roll a new love over.” His voice isn’t great, but his fingers are sure on the strings. He sings with his head bowed and his eyes closed, something throaty and plaintive echoing in the words. It wraps around Ryan’s heart and squeezes. Tight.
He clears his throat and nods. It’s a little vacant, he knows, but there’s heat spreading through his body, lingering in the places where he’s pressed up against Brendon. Maybe this is why he never does gay weddings. Doesn’t really want to see what he’s missing. “Um. Spence really loves Counting Crows. I think I know every word to August and Everything After by now.”
“Ohmygod, Jon,” Brendon interrupts, hushed but excited. “Fucking Aqualung, man. Fucking Brighter Than Sunshine.”
Ryan knows the words to that one too. He just doesn’t really like to think about them.
***
After long weeks of Brendon chattering away with a reporter from Out -- Mark is the name, Ryan thinks -- and even longer weeks of Brendon wheedling Ryan into it, they come to an agreement. The magazine will do a small feature on Ryan.
“We’d like to come photograph the ceremony,” Mark says during one of the rare times that Brendon lets him and Ryan speak on the phone.
“Why that one?” Ryan asks. “Why Spencer and Jon? I do lots of weddings.” He’s not just thinking of his desire to stay out of the gay weddings arena for once. He’s also remembering the look that Spencer gave Jon when Brendon first mentioned the idea. They’d looked hesitant and the agreement had come slowly; Ryan doesn’t want them to feel uncomfortable at their wedding just because they’ve decided to befriend him. After everything they’ve given him, the last thing he wants to do is take something like that away from them.
But Mark has a bunch of reasons. Things about how if there happens to be a gay wedding happening in the right time frame, they might as well feature that one, since it will be more relevant to their audience.
“Ok,” Ryan says finally. “But only the ceremony. And only from a distance, my first priority is maintaining the privacy of my clients. And no photographers at the reception.” He knows that he’s being a PR nightmare, but some things are just more important. Or should be.
And the absolute last thing he wants to do with only two days left until Spencer’s wedding is take part in a photoshoot, but that’s when Mark schedules it. “I have things to do,” he complains to Brendon. “I can’t just sit here for six hours and let people powder my nose. I have to make sure they get the flowers right. And the cake! All those layers, Bren, I can’t let them fuck up Spencer’s cake.”
Brendon arranges for the photographer to follow Ryan around for the day, taking shots at each vendor. The dry cleaner, the bakery, the florist, the caterers, the somewhat less glamorous rental location for the tables and chairs. And then he comes over in the morning to ‘help’ Ryan pick out his clothes. Mostly this involves sprawling across Ryan’s bed and watching him put things on.
Suits and shirts with ties and a light-weight knit sweater and everything feels either too fussy, too gay, or not gay enough. “You need to calm down,” Brendon says. “Seriously. Everything looks great on you. You get dressed every single day and look fantastic. It’s just another day.”
Brendon is wrong. Can’t he see that the sleeves on this jacket are too short? And that the striping on the shirt is all wrong and it makes Ryan look jaundiced? “I don’t even know why I agreed to this,” he mumbles. “It’s a really bad idea.”
“It’s a great idea.” There’s the protest of Ryan’s mattress springs and then the brush of Brendon behind him, his hands on Ryan’s shoulders. “Now this, this is a not so great jacket. Don’t confuse the two.”
Ryan obediently rolls his shoulders back and lets his arms hang limp so Brendon can strip the jacket off of him. And this? This is a bad idea. Brendon’s hands are gentle and sure, deftly putting the jacket back on the hanger and stowing it in the closet. Ryan can’t stop staring at the place where Brendon’s fingers are reflected in the mirror.
“I’m not nervous,” Ryan says, in the manner of someone volunteering information that is very obviously a lie. Brendon hands him a sweater vest- tone on tone argyle that works beautifully with his shirt. It’s jerked carelessly over his head in a matter of seconds, and Ryan’s back to squinting at the mirror. “I just don’t. You know.”
“I know,” Brendon says. His face is smooth in the way it gets when he’s focusing, exactly the same as it is in the photograph hanging in Ryan’s living room. He tucks his thumbs under the knitted edges of the garment Ryan’s so haphazardly donned, carefully lining them up with the seams of Ryan’s shirt. His palms flatten and smooth the fabric down the front, sliding under to straighten the crisp cotton beneath.
Ryan can’t breathe.
Brendon won’t make eye contact.
“These pants are all wrong,” Ryan says stupidly. “I think. Another shade.” He holds his breath while Brendon’s fingers slip down, catching every so often on the buttons of his shirt. He feels dizzy, hollowed out, and Brendon’s so still. Motionless but for the slow downward slide of his fingers. They hit Ryan’s belt, skim across the top edge of the leather.
And then stop. Brendon takes a deep breath and a step backward, but he catches Ryan’s gaze for the first time and his eyes are burning. “I’ll get another pair,” he says, and the very levelness of his voice is a tell. “What color?”
***
At first, the only reason Ryan kept Brendon around during non-wedding times was because of the way he was when they were actually at a wedding. He has this way of charming the crowd; crotchety grandmothers and bitter older cousins are no match for Brendon’s quick hands and bright smile. Brendon can convince the bride’s Cuban mother that the food really is better left until after the ceremony, all while flirting so outrageously that the woman is left blushing when he leads her to her seat. He can convince the jockiest of jocks to put down their beers and settle themselves primly into the tiny white folding chairs.
Ryan’s not so great at that part. He’s usually got about a dozen plates in the air, all spinning, and he doesn’t have time to smooth feathers and calm nerves. Other than the bride’s. The bride is always plate one, the biggest and fastest spinning of them all.
This is maybe the first wedding where Brendon’s quiet competence is more distracting than it is helpful. Ryan keeps catching glimpses out of the corner of his eye: Brendon greeting guests in his pin-striped trousers and t-shirt, Brendon sampling the appetizers with his eyes closed and his head tilted back, Brendon whispering furiously at the DJ when he tries to lay his cords right across the aisle.
And this, at Ryan’s side, leaning in while Spencer and Jon say their vows. Always this, they always watch the actual wedding together. Ryan usually cries. Sometimes out of relief that he’s done with the whole fucking family, sometimes because the ceremony is so beautiful, sometimes just because the bridesmaids are. This time it’s because he’s gut happy for Jon and Spencer, and his tears come from the tight knot in his ribcage instead of the corners of his eyes like they usually do.
Brendon’s hand finds Ryan’s when Jon’s steady voice says “I doooooo.” Spencer is laughing with the sun caught in his hair and Jon fucks off all of the choreography to lift Spencer’s hand to his face and kiss his knuckles. It cues something he’s never felt at any of his weddings: a sharp stab of envy as strong as the earlier one of joy. He laces his fingers with Brendon’s, unthinking, and squeezes.
Later, at the reception, Spencer drags him over to the table he and Jon have claimed (they eschewed the idea of a traditional wedding party dais) and forces him to sit. “I’ve got- I should watch,” Ryan protests.
“You’re fired,” Spencer answers cheerfully. “Sit. I’m married. You have to let me try to fix you up with the other wedding guests.”
He sits, and he actually gets to stay sitting. Brendon’s there too, on Jon’s other side, but he keeps darting up and away so that Ryan can stay in his chair and laugh with Spencer. The last time he darts away, it’s so that he can go to the front and claim the microphone.
“Ahem,” he says, head tilted enough that Ryan can just catch the corner of his grin from behind the mic. Spencer turns, surprised. They’d agreed to no speeches and he has no idea that Jon’s singing, so. “We have a special musical guest,” Brendon says. He has Jon’s guitar in his hand and he’s dragged up a tall stool. Ryan has butterflies in his stomach. “Jon Walker. Your presence is requested on stage one.”
“What?” Spencer asks faintly. He’s clinging to Jon’s hand, his long fingers tangled with Jon’s thicker ones, and his eyes are wide and a little shiny. “What?”
Jon extricates with a kiss and makes his way to the front; Ryan can read the pace of his step and the tense shake of his shoulders. He’s nervous. Hell, Ryan’s nervous, and this has nothing to do with him.
Spencer turns to Ryan and echoes the question. “What?”
“Shhhh.” He wraps his hand around the ball of Spencer’s shoulder and nods his chin toward the stage. “Just watch.”
“Um. Spence.” Jon’s ears are red. His voice is thick. Ryan wants to cry again. “You make me really happy, Spencer James Smith Walker Furbush the Fifth. The least I can do is humiliate myself in public for you, so.” His fingers find the strings and stroke. Ryan’s eyes find Brendon, who’s hovering off to the side wringing his hands.
The crowd pretty much hushes while Jon sings, though there’s the occasional loud sniffle and a cat-call or two when Jon’s voice cracks on one of the verses. Spencer’s face is incandescent, and if Ryan were any sort of wedding planner he’d get up and make sure a camera is pointed at it, but he can’t budge from his seat and the endless visual rotation of Jon, singing for Spencer, Spencer, beaming at Jon, and Brendon, whose eyes are either burning into Ryan’s neck or watching Spencer.
Absolutely no one averts their eyes when the song ends and Jon comes back to the table to bend over Spencer and kiss him. It’s intimate and hungry and every eye in the place is glued to them, longing. Ryan thinks he even hears Spencer’s mom sigh. They break apart, Spencer’s hands on Jon’s chest, Jon’s mouth by his ear. Ryan can see Jon’s lips moving, but he can’t hear the words.
It’s time for cake though. Fired or not fired, Ryan has things to do, he has to- why is Jon going back to the stage? It’s Ryan’s turn to blink stupidly when Jon bends toward the microphone and says, “I’d ask you to bear with us for one more musical number, but… it’s our wedding. So you’ll do what we want, right?”
Wait. Another musical number? Ryan doesn’t know anything about another musical number. “What?” He says, an unconscious if spot-on impression of Spencer from five minutes ago.
“Shhhh,” Spencer says back. He’s turned his chair and taken Ryan’s hands, and he’s looking at him like they’re about to jump off of a cliff together. Ryan can read the Are you ready for this? in Spencer’s eyes.
When he looks back toward Jon, the stool is to the side and Brendon is in front of the microphone looking like he’s about to die. “Hi,” he says, his voice weak this time. “I’d like to. This song is.” He laughs self consciously and turns to Jon, shrugging. “Isn’t love grand, you guys?”
Jon’s hands move on the guitar again, but this time it’s Brendon who sings, and there’s absolutely no doubt who he’s looking at. “Well I know it’s kind of late,” he starts. The tune is familiar, and after years of Brendon singing his way through the day, the voice should be too. It’s not. It’s husky. Hopeful. Brendon has one hand pressed to his stomach like he’s afraid something’s going to break out of his bellybutton, and the other is wrapped around the microphone, white knuckled. “I hope I didn’t wake you. What I gotta say can’t wait, I know you’d understand.”
Oh, God. Ryan knows this song. His fingers tighten on Spencer’s, and though he can feel Spencer’s smile warming his cheek he can’t see it. The whole world has narrowed down to Brendon leaning into the microphone stand, singing. “’Cause every time I tried to tell you, the words just came out wrong. So I have to say I love you in a song.”
It’s short, the song is short, thank God, because if it was any longer Ryan would probably be passed out by the end of it. As it is, he’s barely managing shallow, tremulous breaths when Brendon’s voice fades away.
Jon leans the guitar against the stool, but that happens somewhere in the corner of Ryan’s awareness, because Brendon has stepped to the side and is staring at Ryan with his whole fucking heart in his eyes. And that look. Ryan knows that look. Ryan’s seen that look at least three times a week every week for the last two and a half years of his life, but he never knew it was- God.
“Um,” Spencer says in his ear. “Are you going to go kiss him, or have you suffered some sort of permanent brain damage that I don’t know about?”
“I,” Ryan starts. “Um. It’s your wedding, Spence. I don’t-”
“Shut the fuck up,” Spencer says, and his hands shift and shove Ryan out of his chair. “Get your ass over there.”
It’s thirteen feet from his chair to Brendon. It feels like a single step. “Bren,” he says, but he can’t find the right path from that familiar syllable to any place where his heart won’t feel like it’s exploding, so he cups his hands around the back of Brendon’s neck and kisses him instead.