Work Text:
Aiobheann liked to believe she was a good lawyer. She’d moved to New York over a decade ago, taken her bar, and started working in the family law department at the firm she’d remained at since she started. She got on well with her coworkers, made enough to live comfortably and travel home to see her family fairly frequently, and loved the work she was doing.
Unfortunately, a certain Sean Conlon had been disrupting this near-perfect balance as of late. He was young, impressively young. Hired right out of Columbia Law School, Sean had clearly skipped a few grades, either that or he had an intense case of baby face. Aiobheann had tried to be welcoming when he’d first arrived, she knew how difficult it was to start a new job, especially at that age, but she hadn’t been met with any sort of appreciation for her efforts.
No, Sean clearly thought he was better than everyone else. He didn’t speak unless necessary, always responded with as few words as possible, and never accepted invitations to spend time with his coworkers outside of the office. Sure, he was incredible at what he did, but whenever he wasn’t working he had headphones in and was messaging someone. It was abundantly clear that he was there to work, not to make friends. Which was fine, Aiobheann just wished he would be less outwardly standoffish.
To top it all off, she was pretty sure he was homophobic.
The air conditioning in the office had broken, because of course it had. Everybody had taken about an hour to abandon all professionalism and get rid of as much clothing as possible. Most women had tights stashed in their handbags, and the men had all taken off their jackets, rolled up their sleeves, taken off their tie, and unbuttoned a few buttons. That was when Aiobheann discovered Sean Conlon’s tattoos.
They were everywhere, every part of his body that could be covered by a suit was inked. Most of them were black and grey, but the one that really stood out to Aiobheann was the royal blue crown in the centre of his chest, between his collarbones. Only part of it was visible through the gap in his slightly unbuttoned shirt, but she could see the stylised lines reminiscent of a celtic knot, even without the stark colour difference from every other tattoo it was clear that this one was special.
“I don’t mean to pry,” Aiobheann said, taking a sip from her iced coffee as she leant against the door to his office, “but does the crown tattoo symbolise anything?”
“My boyfriend.” Sean deadpanned, not even looking up from his work.
And, ok, Aiobheann knew that Sean was kind of an asshole, but she didn’t expect him to be openly homophobic. “That’s not funny, you know?”
Sean didn’t even grace her with an answer, so she continued. “There are gay people in this office, making fun of gay people like that could offend them. And even if everyone in the office was straight, that still isn’t right.”
“I know that there are gay people in this office,” Sean replied.
Aiobheann huffed and marched back to her desk. So much for attempting to be his friend. If Sean was going to be openly discriminatory, Aiobheann wasn’t going to try.
A few weeks after the aircon incident, Aiobheann was beginning to question her entire career path. She’d been working on a case for god knows how long and nothing was working in her favour. Just as she was beginning to question if the documents she was reading were even written in English, the buzzer to enter the floor sounded and she dashed to her feet to answer it. Sure, one might claim she was looking for an excuse to take a break, but she liked to believe she was just hospitable.
On the other side of the door stood a tall blond. A very tall blond. He was dressed so entirely out of place that she was half convinced he’d gotten the wrong address. The blond wore light joggers, tatty converse, a “sun’s out, guns’s out” vest, and a windbreaker that read NYU Dance Team ‘20. He had a picnic blanket tucked under one hand and a picnic basket held in the other.
“Hi!” He greeted, shaking her out of her shock, “I’m Racer! Is Spot around?”
“Hi… Racer?” She replied, holding out a hand, “I’m Aiobheann, I’d be happy to help you, but I don’t think I know a Spot.”
“Oh, his name is-” Racer’s eyes widened as he stared at something over her shoulder, “don’t worry, he’s right there.”
Sure enough, standing in the entrance to his office, looking the happiest she’d ever seen him, was Sean Conlon. Racer stepped around her and made it to the shorter man in a few steps, dropping the picnic basket and blanket and pulling him into a hug. They stood for a moment before pulling back slightly and pressing their foreheads together. Racer had to lean down so far it would almost be comical if it wasn’t so sweet.
“Hey,” Sean almost whispered, leaning up to place a gentle kiss to the blond’s lips. Aiobheann felt like she shouldn’t be watching, like she was intruding on a private moment, but this was a Sean so different from the one she knew that it was impossible to look away.
“Hey,” Racer responded, giggling and grabbing Sean’s face to pepper his cheeks and the bridge of his nose with kisses, “I brought you a picnic.”
Racer leant down to grab his picnic basket and Aiobheann finally got a proper look at Sean’s face. He was bright red, so red she didn’t know a person could go that colour, and grinning like a madman. Aiobheann’s movement towards her office grabbed his attention and he looked up, eyes widening as he made eye contact with her.
“I’m so sorry,” he said.
“No it’s-” she paused, “it’s ok. Have fun with your picnic, I’ve been dying to get out of the office.”
Sean somehow went even redder.
“Oh we’re not leaving the office!” Racer piped up, “we’re doing an under-desk picnic, Sean’s window has a nice view and we used to do this kinda thing in college. Gotta christen the desk- oh fuck no not like that- shit sorry this is a professionl environment I shouldn’t swear. I’m normally better than this, I work with kids. Sorry I’m rambling, we gotta do our first under-desk picnic in the new office!”
Aiobheann blinked, wondering how on earth two people so wildly different had come to find each other. “Oh well, have fun with your under desk picnic then!”
As she made her way back to her office she heard them softly bickering, something about Sean’s resting bitch face and needing to put himself out there more. She smiled softly to herself, maybe Sean Conlon wasn’t that bad.