19 year old Justin Taylor was not having a good day. Evidently the day was still young, but previous experience had taught him that if something didn't start well, chances are it's going to end pretty crappy too. He hoped against hope that things would improve just this once.

Today was going to be his first day of work at Vanguard, a renowned advertising agency in Pittsburgh and god only knew he needed all the good luck he could get. Less money was not a possibility he wanted to consider. Ever since his parents' divorce, he had been flipping through the yellow pages like a maniac and had already landed a job at a diner on Liberty Avenue the week before.

Chances were his father would freak if he ever found out Justin was going to be working on Liberty Avenue. But he had lost the right to be freaked out about anything the minute he had refused to keep paying for Justin's art school now, hadn't he?

Besides, Justin liked working at the diner. Sure, it was minimum wage and serving tweaked out queens who kept grabbing his ass at two in the morning had more drawbacks than positives, but at least he was somewhere he felt like he belonged. More than he did at St. James Academy, anyway.

Debbie, a loud, colorful waitress there - also known as the patron saint for queers everywhere - had instantly taken him under her wing and shown him the ropes. His upbringing had not equipped him to survive at the diner, but Debbie's saucy comebacks and vulgar sexual innuendos to the patrons were education enough.

Now Justin was able to tell when a Couple's Surprise plate was edible and when it might lead to a not so pleasant surprise, what nosy questions were too nosy to ask Kiki the waitress- formerly known as Kenny the waiter- and when it was better to just reply with a wink and a smile at a flirty customer- instead of telling them to shut their mouth and keep their hands to themselves.

Altogether, working at the diner was a nice experience but there was no way it could pay the rent, so a second job was needed. Attending PIFA was out of the question for now, but Justin hoped he'd be able to save enough money to go next year, while helping his mother and Molly out as much as he could too. Besides it would be nice to work somewhere where he'd be able to create.

Justin Taylor, Junior Artist, Vanguard Advertising. It had a nice ring to it. Although Justin Taylor, Creative Director, Vanguard Advertising sounded even better, that would probably take 30 years to happen, if it ever did, and Justin was pretty sure he would have left the advertising world by then.

"Up so early?" Ethan asked from his place on the bed.

"I'm already running late." Justin replied, while putting on his shoes. He went over to the cracked mirror Ethan had rescued from a garbage truck, to fix his hair hurriedly. Breaking a mirror meant seven years of bad luck. Not a good sign.

"Oh right. First day at work."

Justin nodded absentmindedly.

"Are you nervous?"

"That's the understatement of the year."

Ethan got up and came to stand behind Justin in front of the mirror, placing his chin on the teen's shoulder. "You know you don't have to do this. You can just stay here… have breakfast with me…"

"And I take it you'll pay for the food, and the cat's food and the rent and the heat and everything else?"

Ethan thought of it for a second. "We can figure something out. Maybe I'll work the streets more. Maybe even all night. People feel exceptionally romantic at 4 in the morning. They'd like some violin."

Justin looked at Ethan in the mirror. "That sounds good. Only problem is you won't have a cell phone to call me from the hospital when someone mugs you and beats you up."

"Well, we don't want that to happen." Ethan said and started kissing his cheek and down his neck.

Justin smiled. "No we don't. Now let me get my coat and go to work ok?"

Ethan begrudgingly moved away to sit on the bed again and watch Justin getting ready from there.

"Just call me the minute things get too tough for you over there. So I can come rescue you and we can go to that bistro we love and have hot chocolate." Ethan said after a minute.

Justin let out a disgusted grunt. "God I hate that place. And frankly I don't appreciate you putting me down before I even start working there."

"I'm not putting you down. I'm just saying, it's not going to be Liberty Diner. You're going to have to work hard there."

"Then I'm going to have to work hard there." Justin answered, sipping on a cup of coffee hurriedly. He ended up burning his tongue. Severe tongue burn probably counted as another bad omen, right?

Ethan kept staring at him pensively. "I asked around about that Brian Kinney guy."

"Who?"

"Your future boss. He has a reputation and is not one of the most sympathetic people to work for."

"Well, I'll have to make him into one then." Justin replied, getting tired of all of Ethan's jinxing.

"He'll probably be an asshole with no taste who won't appreciate your talent. And he'll have you do tasteless tacky advertisements for baby wipes and colognes."

Justin stopped on his way to the door. "They make great ads over there."

"Come on; is there such a thing as a great ad?"

"There will be once I'm through with it." Justin replied, trying to self-boost his confidence.

"Are you mad at me?" Ethan asked.

"No, I'm not mad at you."

"Yes you are. You are pursing your lips. You are super mad at me right now."

Justin let out a long sigh. "I have to go Ethan."

"See? And you haven't even worked an hour there yet. By the end of the week you'll have my head in a toilet or something."

Justin laughed half heartedly at Ethan's feeble attempt to lighten the mood. The truth was he was a little annoyed at the other man. And he'd be a lot more if he caused him to be late on his first day at work. "Bye." He tossed, turning his back.

"No kiss goodbye?"

The blonde sighed once more, but moved over to the bed to kiss Ethan on the lips.

"You'll do great." Ethan decided to finally encourage him. "They are lucky to have you."

Justin smiled and left, a lot less sure of himself than he had been that morning.

If a black cat crossed his path on his way to Vanguard, he'd probably just leave the whole damn thing all together.

At Vanguard

Justin had made it to work, well ahead of time. Ethan had managed to spook Justin well and good. Vanguard seemed much bigger and far more imposing than it had been when Justin had come for an interview. Everyone seemed to have somewhere to go and something to do, and the butterflies in his stomach were trying very hard to escape. Damn Ethan and all his jinxing!

Wendy, the receptionist, was mercifully nice. She smiled at him kindly, and told him go to the office of the Art Director who hired him, one Steven Matthews. Steven had been very nice and pleasant going at the interview, and Justin had found it easy to impress him.

He found Steven's office and was about to knock, when he noticed that the door was ajar and he could hear voices inside. Justin took a few steps back, wondering if he should interrupt, when he heard his name being mentioned.

" – Justin Taylor. His work was pretty impressive. This is his resume." Voice 1 said (it sounded like Steven.)

There was a slight pause.

"Who the fuck is this Taylor? Jesus, Steve, I leave you in charge for a week, and you hire some nineteen year old kid? I hope he can colour inside the lines. Did you bother reading his resume? He hasn't even completed his course at…at PIFA! What kind of person gets into PIFA and then decides to take time off? We probably have coat stands with a better sense of purpose. I can't go away for one goddamn week before this place turns into a nuthouse. One mistake and he's out – got it? No one is getting paid to babysit around here."

The butterflies inside Justin's stomach? They were dead after hearing that. He took several more steps backwards, and stood standing there, frozen. This was not a good way to start his new job. He almost wished he had been late, so that he wouldn't have heard that. Justin seriously considered turning around and leaving. Let Ethan work longer hours till he finds another agency to work for. Then he paused.

Ethan. Who would undoubtedly laugh at him and say 'I told you so' if Justin didn't manage to even last an hour at Vanguard. Fuck no, Justin thought. I don't need a babysitter, and I can certainly colour inside the lines. I guess I'll just have to prove my worth.

The door suddenly opened, and this he's-so-fucking-hot-he-cannot-be-real brunette walked out.

He was the handsomest, hottest man that Justin had ever laid his eyes upon. That face, that body…the inside of his mouth suddenly felt very, very dry.

"Justin!" Steven was right behind the brunette. "Good to see you here nice and early."

Justin managed to smile, though he was struggling to find the right words.

"Brian, this is Justin Taylor, the junior artist we hired. Justin, this is Brian Kinney, one of the partners at Vanguard."

Holy fuck, the man was gorgeous!

Brian looked Justin up and down, and then turned to Steven. "Does he talk, or do I have to pull a string?"

"Uh…pleased to meet you, Mr. Kinney. I've –"

Brian cut him off. "Whatever. Steve, I want the visuals for Spring Breeze on my table by three o'clock."

With that, he was gone.

The rest of the day flew past Justin. He didn't have much time meet the staff; in fact, he didn't have any time to do anything at all. It turned out that the visuals for Spring Breeze had not been touched for the entire length of Brian's absence, and Steve was scrambling to throw something together by three o'clock. Justin got paired up with a copy writer named Kathy, and the two of them were given the brief and told to produce 'at least' four concepts, because they supposedly had a week to have worked on it.

"Welcome to advertising, kiddo." Kathy said with a wry smile. Justin liked Kathy. She was at least 28, and apparently had worked as a feature writer at a women's magazine before switching to copywriting.

When they had finished the third concept, Justin nervously asked Kathy if they had to formally present them to Brian. Justin was so not looking forward to that.

Kathy laughed. "Are you kidding? You just joined today, and Spring Breeze isn't even my account. I'd like to see Steve try and explain to Brian how the two of us were working on these visuals for the better part of last week.

Nah, we'll have to have this shit together by two o'clock, and Steven or Josie will go over them with Brian. But don't worry, if Brian likes them he'll never know that it's our ideas, and if he doesn't like them, well, you better get used to making coffee for Steve, and I'll be back to working on the accounts I'm assigned to."

Justin didn't know whether he should be relieved or disappointed. One way or another, there was no way he was going to get stuck making coffee in both his jobs.