cowt 9 (S4 M2): the fish fetishists fan club (jaime/brienne, jonc/brynden, pg13)

[janie_tangerine]

The last thing Jaime had expected, walking into the small office at the radio station, was for both his co-workers he shares it with to stand up, stare at him as if they really want to figure something out and then about circle him.

 

“Uh,” he says, “is there anything wrong?”

 

He doubts it would be — he always got along with both of them, and he was actually in mind of asking them some dating advice since they’ve been together a while and are both, well, older than him though not overtly much, and he’ll go to his grave before telling Brynden Tully openly that he gave him better advice in two years than his father ever did in his entire life, but still. He thought he had no problem with them.

 

“Not exactly,” Jon says, his eyes still fixed on him, “but we need to ask you something of uttermost importance.”

 

“All — all right?” Jaime asks back.

 

“First of all,” Brynden says, “if you don’t want your entire office knowing that you and Brienne had the time of your life last night, you should show up with your shirt not inside out and not wearing her perfume.”

 

“Wait, what — oh, fuck, how did you — wait, you know her perfume?”

 

“I’ve been down in her department for a lot of time,” Brynden says dryly, “and you think I don’t remember it?”

 

Right. Because he was chief engineer while she was maintenance for months until she got promoted to chief and he was promoted station manager. Okay, but —

 

“Okay, but what was the question?”

“Was yesterday the first time or not?” Jon asks bluntly. “Not because I overtly care, but we put money on the two of you not waiting until the third date in the office betting pool and if we have it right, we can pay you drinks for the next month.”

 

Jaime has a feeling his face just turned a way, way darker shade of red than he could have ever imagined. “Wait, the office has a betting pool?”

 

“Jaime, even the janitor chimed in. Actually, I think he chimed in with us?” Brynden asks.

 

“Yeah,” Jon agrees, “we definitely owe Davos some of that share. So?”

 

Christ. Well, no point in denying it at this point, also because he wasn’t planning on keeping it hidden and neither did she. “Yeah, it was the first date and yes, we might have not waited, but — are you serious —”

 

They high-five each other. What the hell —

 

“Score,” Brynden says. “Connington, let Varys know he owes us.”

 

“… How much exactly?” Jaime asks, feeling kind of scared to do it, but also feeling like he has to know.

 

“Oh, a year’s worth of bets. Told you, you and the lady can come have free drinks with us for the entire next month, it’s not even going to put a dent in it.”

 

“You’re telling me that the entire station actually —”

 

“What can we say,” Jon grins, going back to his desk, “you two were that obvious. And now that this is solved to everyone’s satisfaction, you’ve got to handle the guests for Oberyn’s show for the next month and I have to check the contracts for the commercials while Brynden curses the yearly budget, I think we’ve lost enough time with frivolities.”

 

Jaime doesn’t even try to out-sass him and goes to his computer, turning it on and reminding himself to not use Brienne’s cologne next time — at worst he can go without, it’s not like he is hosting any show around here. Thankfully, because he’s had enough of limelight for his entire life as far as he’s concerned.

 

Fine, maybe he doesn’t do the money ha used to at his father’s company anymore, and he doesn’t have access to the general family money reserve anymore, but given how much he gained when it came to his general well-being, he wouldn’t go back if paid to.

 

And if the kick he needed to leave had to be Cersei getting married to Robert Baratheon and calmly informing him that they didn’t have to break things off, she could still see him on the side, well, at least it did give him that kick.

 

It’s not like he hasn’t taken a lot of blows to his pride for her throughout his life, but he wasn’t going to just wait for her on the sidelines for his entire life, never mind that as much as he doesn’t like Robert much, he still doesn’t want to be the kind of person that anyone cheats their partner on with.

 

He turns on his computer and lets it load, checking his phone.

 

That picture he put of his hand and Brienne’s tangled together on his extremely private Facebook account from which he unfriended Cersei a long time ago and on which he has no one from work has only a few likes, of course, since not many people can see it, but all the comments are from his brother and Bronn and after the tenth innuendo he sees them exchanging he rolls his eyes and closes the app. He posts the romantic picture and of course they’d go there.

 

Ah, well. He’ll check if she also posted it, too, she said she might, but after he gets out of the mess of getting that Melisandre Asshai indie singer to Oberyn’s show, they’ve been trying to get her for weeks and they still haven’t figured it out.

 

He opens his e-mail, starts looking for the last one he exchanged with Melisandre’s agent —

 

And then the door slams open and Cersei walks straight into the room.

 

In the next five seconds, as in, before her eyes find his and she starts talking, he notices at least the following.

 

One: she hasn’t done her hair or make-up, which means she must have left her place in a hurry, because she usually never shows up anywhere looking less than spotless put together.

 

Two: she took care to wear heels — she’d be standing at his height, if he stood up.

 

Three: he hasn’t seen her look so angry in years.

 

(Since that time he brought home that Valentine’s card from that friend of hers, Melara.

 

Jaime doesn’t really like to think about how that poor girl changed schools a month later.)

 

He wonders if he should try to talk to her, standing up and moving in front of his desk.

 

But then —

 

“How could you?” She about shouts in his face, and for a moment he doesn’t get what the fuck she’s aiming at.

 

“Er,” he says, “how about you try being a bit more specific? Because I haven’t seen you in a hell of a long time and you haven’t even bothered to call me on our birthday since, I’ll need a bit more information.”

 

“Oh, don’t try to beat around the bush,” she goes on, “how could you betray me?”

 

Jaime glances at his left. Connington is looking like a proper mixture of worry and confusion, not that he doesn’t feel the exact same way.

 

“First,” he says, “we’re in public, but thank you for telling everyone in here that we — never fucking mind. Second, we were done the moment you asked me to wait on the side because of course I could absolutely spend my entire life waiting for you, and excuse me but I do have some self-respect, so I haven’t betrayed anyone. At most if you want to take it back up, you would be cheating on Robert, I’ve got nothing to do with this. Third, I have a fucking life. I imagine it’s about my Facebook picture that you saw from Tyrion’s phone or whatever?”

 

“Oh, don’t. Of course I did. And no one ever said we were broken up.”

 

At least she lowered her voice now.

 

Christ. Jaime spends a moment to feel good about himself and the fact that the moment he realized there was nothing not fucked up about him and Cersei he found a good analyst so at least he knows where he stands now, but — seriously?

 

“I don’t know,” he says, “you married someone else. Don’t you think I felt betrayed at that point? And I did tell you I wasn’t going to wait for you on the side. I quit my job, I haven’t spoken to Father in years, and you seriously thought I wasn’t going to move on because I was joking?”

 

It would almost be fun, he thinks as he realizes that Cersei absolutely did not expect him to say that, if it wasn’t happening to him, in his workplace, in front of people he actually does like and if the entire office wasn’t hearing this, most likely.

 

“And you’d betray me with her?” She asks, disgusted, shoving in his face a phone of Brienne’s Facebook profile picture.

 

Jaime takes a step back.

 

“She has a lot of things going for her,” he says, “first of all that she actually wouldn’t presume that you can have two relationships at once if all partners don’t agree. What,” he spits back, “now you’re jealous?”

 

She stares at him. Then laughs.

 

“Do you seriously expect me to be jealous of your relationship?” She wheezes. “If you’re serious about her —”

 

“We’re plenty serious, thanks.”

 

“Then your girlfriend looks like what would happen if a cow and a childless old hag had a baby, but then again any ridiculous looking woman can land a guy, if she’s pathetic enough and he has to get back at others, good to know you’re both proud of your non-achievements. But honestly, looking at her? Must be like screwing a dead fish.”

 

Oh, fuck, the door is open.

 

Most likely every fucking one has heard her in the hallway, and since the walls and the floor are fairly thin, maybe also downstairs, and shit, Brienne doesn’t deserve this kind of public humiliation when she hasn’t even met Cersei, for —

 

“Cersei, now you’re fucking out of line —”

 

“Uhm,” Connington coughs, standing up.

 

“And who are you?” Cersei asks, looking at him instead. Jaime is honestly glad for the momentary respite.

 

“Jon Connington, production director, thank you very much. Now, never mind that I would appreciate if you’d avoid insulting our chief engineer, who is one of our greatest assets, that’d be great.” He smirks. What the — “But I also would like to inform you that you must have really wrong ideas about what screwing fish entails.”

 

Cersei stares blankly at him.

 

Jaime gets it, instead, and he about tries to not laugh while Brynden immediately catches on the drift and clears his throat as he moves behind the desk, too, showing off that t-shirt he usually wears when he doesn’t have to meet any investors. The one with the black fish over the red and blue background that his nephews got him for Christmas ages ago because of some family story Jaime hasn’t been informed of in detail. He does know that his niece and great-nephews call him Blackfish, though, and he never made a mystery of being interested in marine biology as a hobby.

 

“What,” she says, “are you aiming at?”

 

He puts a hand behind Brynden’s shoulders. “Just wanted to inform you that he’s gone around with half of his family calling him blackfish for years and I can one hundred per cent assure you he’s an excellent lay.”

 

“Oh,” Brynden goes on, “it’s always nice to hear that outside the bedroom.” He winks. Jaime decides that he doesn’t care how much money they won betting on him, he’s going to invite them to dinner. “That said, I guess she hasn’t even caught up on pop culture, right?”

 

“Nah,” Jon goes on. “I mean, people won Oscars because they wanted to screw fish, and she thinks it’s an insult? How sad.”

 

“I know, right? Also sorry but that fishman had an ass that was out of a dream.”

 

“Not as much as yours,” Jon winks back at him, “but yeah, well, we did agree on that, did we?”

 

“All things considered,” Brynden agrees, “even if she’s not exactly my type for obvious reasons, I think we could agree that when it comes to that department Brienne definitely could give him a run for his money, couldn’t she?”

 

“Totally,” Jon nods. “I mean, absolutely platonically, but she does have a great ass. I’m pretty sure Jaime appreciates it, too, but then again he’s been staring at it for months which is why all of us had the betting pool, so it’s no mystery.”

 

Cersei is going so red in the face at that exchange that Jaime is honestly about to explode in laughter.

 

“Thanks,” Jaime tells them, “I’ll make sure I’ll tell her next time, it’s an excellent Halloween costume idea. Now, as we established that I’m not betraying you and that at best if you come here looking to take things back up you would be doing that to Robert and that anyway you did it to me in the first place, are you going to leave and let me go back to my goddamned job? We’re done. And for that matter, we’ve been together properly for less than two days but I’ve been friends with her for months and believe me, I’m just kicking myself for wasting my time with you until I did. At least we talk, I don’t have to beg for scraps of her time, we like each other and she isn’t above kicking my ass if needed, and honestly? Of course you’re not jealous, since I guess you don’t know what you’re missing but it doesn’t matter to you because after all all your relationships are just about you and everyone else has to be at your damned service. Also, I have to think she’s attractive, not you. I don’t owe you anything more and you can just leave before I decide to call Robert and inform him of what just went on here.”

 

Cersei stares at him for a long, long moment.

 

Then she turns on her heels and gets out, slamming the door behind her.

 

Shit.

 

“Woah,” Brynden says, “I’m never ever complaining about how my relationship with my brother was bad, at least he just straight-up said he couldn’t talk to me if I was into men.”

 

Jaime snorts, wiping sweat from his forehead. “Well, I guess you know why when I applied here I wasn’t in my best mood.”

 

“No one’s blaming you for that, either,” Jon says, looking thoroughly disturbed. “Hey, you all right? Because I mean, no one’s going to be an ass about her around here. And if you want to take twenty and get some air, it’s fine. Melisandre’s agent can wait another half hour.”

 

“It’s — I’m fine,” he says, “but maybe I do want to take twenty. I’m just, I’m really sorry she thought —”

 

“Can it,” Brynden says, “and go get coffee or something, I’ll call Clegane and tell him to not let her in if she tries again.”

 

And then someone knocks on the door and Brienne walks in, and thankfully she doesn’t look like she’s pissed off at him.

 

“Well,” she says, “that was interesting. So what,” she asks, looking at Brynden, “should I get one shirt like yours?”

 

“Well, we worked together for years,” he grins, “I don’t see why you can’t be into the club. I’ll tell Robb and Jon to find me whatever design they cobbled together next time I see them, how about it? We can found a club or something.”

 

“I’ll do you one better,” Jon grins. “You two get the shirts. He and I get two others with something like president and first member of the fish fetishists club, how about that?”

 

“I’m entirely down with it,” Brienne winks at the both of them. “And I suppose that if he’s taking twenty —”

 

“Yeah, yeah, take twenty with him, no one’s stopping you,” Brynden tells them.

 

Jaime immediately heads for the roof, Brienne following him. Shit. He did need fresh air.

 

“Hey,” she tells him, “don’t worry about what she said about me, it’s not like I haven’t heard worse. You all right?”

 

Her hand finds his and he tangles their fingers together as he looks down at the street and then at her large blue eyes that look the same color as the summer sky above them.

 

“Now I’m plenty all right, thanks,” he says. “But we totally are putting pictures on Facebook when those shirts arrive.”

 

She snorts. “Done deal.”

 

Then her mouth is on his and he forgets about what just happened completely.

 

He has better things to do, after all.

 

— —

 

When, two weeks later, they post on Brienne’s public profile a picture of the two of them with her wearing a white shirt with a blue fish over it the same shape as the one Brynden has while his own has a first honorary member of the fish fetishists fan club, it kind of crashes his app’s notifications, and hers as well.

 

He’s totally using next Christmas to send Cersei a card, and if she never replies, well, it’s not as if he expected it.

 

But he’s still absolutely going to do it.

 

 

End.