‘ THE PROPOSAL’

Kurt Hummel was running late. Which would have been bad enough on a regular day, but today was his first day as one of Ari Gold’s assistants. And that meant one thing; under no circumstances could he arrive at the office after Ari did. It still hadn’t surprised him when his car refused to start. Just his luck. Back in Ohio, his dad owned an auto repair shop and Kurt had help out whenever he needed money while he was still living at home. So at first, he tried to fix the car himself, but the end result was a smear of oil on his brand new suit. He’d bought three suits at Hugo Boss when his nose had stopped running a few days ago and after checking the prize tags, had handed the sale’s woman Ari’s business card.

Cursing loudly, Kurt ran back into his apartment and called a cab while he changed his jacket. The cab arrive five minutes later and Kurt thought that maybe, if he was lucky, he would only be a few minutes late and Ari wouldn’t find out. And if he was incredibly lucky, Santana remembered their friendship and covered for him.

Even home sick with the flu, the office grape vine had reach him and so he’d found out the next day that Ari’s other hire was Santana Lopez, a girl he’d gone to high school with back in Ohio. Though in high school, the only reason Santana had talked to him at all was because they were in drama club together. Kurt, because he was a theater geek, and Santana, because their school’s guidance councilor thought it would help her with her anger issues. Kurt didn’t find out the reason for her anger until after Santana’s graduation – she was a year ahead of him – when her former boyfriend and the school’s quarterback posted a picture on his Friendster page of Santana leaving Scandals, Lima’s only gay bar, with another girl. When her former classmates started to cyber bully her, Kurt reached out to Santana and told her he’d be there for her if she ever wanted to talk. She never took him up on the offer, but after she heard about ‘the incident’, it was Santana who convinced him to leave Ohio and join her at UCLA. And it was also Santana who, after getting a job at Gold Standard, helped him get hired there as well after his own graduation. Now, his only hope was that she wouldn’t hold it against him that he’d gotten promoted so soon, while it had taken her a year and a half.

Kurt paid the cabbie and rushed into the foyer of the building. Gold Standard was on Wilshire Blvd in Beverly Hills, like many other L.A based talent agencies. After severing ties with his former partner, Ari Gold had made sure though, that his new agency was the largest in the city with the most office space. After swiping his employee card, Kurt got onto the elevator and pressed the button for the top floor. As the doors opened at his destination, he could hear Santana speaking with their boss.

“Yeah, Kurt’s here. He just went to the bathroom for a moment.”

Kurt quickly hid his laptop bag behind a large fichus before rounding the corner. “Good morning, Mr. Gold,” he greeted his new boss politely.

"Call me Ari," his boss waved him off and walked into his office. Once the door closed behind him, Kurt turned to Santana. “Thanks. My car wouldn’t start.”

Santana pulled a bottle of nail polish from her bag and continued painting her nails. “No problem. But you owe me.”

Kurt swallowed. Coming from Santana that sounded like a threat. After making sure that Ari wasn’t paying them any attention, Kurt retrieved his bag and settled in front of his computer. For the next two hours, he replied to emails, took calls and familiarized himself with Ari’s schedule. He scanned the gossip magazines to see if any of their clients had made the headlines over the weekend and checked Lifejournal and Twitter to see what the fans were saying about the agency’s top stars. Shortly after nine, he and Santana got the conference room ready for the staff meeting – tap water for the employees and Evian for Ari. The conference room, which seated twenty people, was equipped with the most modern technology, so every agent could easily share his or her files with the rest of the team. At nine thirty on the dot, Ari marched into the conference room, and Kurt and Santana moved to stand behind his chair.

“Blaine Anderson has been without an agent for nearly seventy-two hours. I gave you the weekend to come up with ideas on how we get him to sign with us.”

Kurt perked up. Teen heartthrob Blaine Anderson was looking for representation and coincidentally, Kurt was working in an agency. Maybe they could meet – to discuss business of course – and then Blaine would realize that he wasn’t into girls after all and asked for Kurt’s hand in marriage. He was brutally yanked from his daydream when Ari yelled at a young agent.

“Don’t make suggestions if you don’t know shit about the client. Anderson’s made it clear he wants to leave the high school setting behind and try to land more mature roles.”

“My contact at Warner says they’ve optioned the rights to Aquaman IV. Gyllenhaal won’t do another one and Anderson looks like a younger Vincent Chase,” a young female agent piped up. Ari shot her down immediately.

“The script’s horrible, I’ve never even heard of the director and they cut two thirds of the special effects budget. Pass.”

Kurt listened intently as the agents tried to convince Ari that they knew the right way to land Blaine Anderson.

“Maybe we should just throw him a party,” a senior agent suggested. “Make sure there are plenty of hot and willing chicks for him and his entourage and let him know that we’d take care of his every wish. Lakers’ tickets, parties at Chateau, girls; he names it, we provide it. Show him what a full service agency can do for him.”

Ari considered the idea for a moment. Then he nodded. “I like it. Wine and dine him before we ask him to get into bed with us.” He swiveled around in his chair and turned to Santana and Kurt. “You,” he pointed at Santana. “Get me his manager so we can figure out when the guy’s available. And you,” he addressed Kurt, “ find me a venue that screams I’m expensive as fuck.”

As they walked out of the conference room, Santana leaned into Kurt and whispered into his ear. “That’s so not going to impress Blaine Anderson.” Ari overheard her though.

“What was that?” he asked, his tone of voice making it clear he expected an answer.

Santana flinched, but then she squared her shoulders. “Not here,” she said, her voice barely wavering.

Ari glared at his assistants. “You two, my office, now!” The boy looked like he wanted to protest, but he snapped his mouth shut. Smart decision.

“Santana, what the fuck are you doing?” Kurt hissed as he followed his irate boss down the hallway to his office. The other assistants on the floor looked at them as if they were being marched to the guillotines. And who knew, maybe they were.

Ari’s office was decorated with a large, mahogany desk, a dark brown, leather office chair, a five thousand dollar Kartell sofa for talks with clients and two wooden chairs in front of the desk – reserved for subordinates invited for a friendly chat. The walls were covered with paintings by famous artists, though it was an open secret that the originals hung in Ari’s home and would only end up at Gold Standard over Mrs. Ari’s dead body. When the door closed behind Kurt and Santana, Ari sat down in his chair. He didn’t offer them a seat, before he started yelling.

“What the fuck’s wrong with you people today? I started out in the mail room. I was a fucking assistant. It’s really not that hard. You answer phones, you take notes and unless you’re actually asked your opinion, you keep your fucking mouth shut! So this better be good or you can both pack your bags. How are people going to take me seriously, if I can’t even control my own assistants?” The question obviously was rhetoric. “So make it good. Make it fantastic.”

Kurt thought it best not to mention that he hadn’t done anything and prayed that Santana really had information none of the other agents at Gold Standard had. He didn’t want to get fired the first day of his new job.

Without invitation, Santana sat down on one of the chairs and crossed her long legs. She pointedly ignored the daggers Ari was glaring at her.

“While I was in college, I interned with Williams PR. And your boy Anderson, he caused them a lot of trouble. Always getting photographed in parts of the town he shouldn’t have gone to – at least according to his agent. Whenever that happened, it was the interns’ job to scour the Internet and find a recent picture of him with a co-star. His publicist would make sure that every gossip magazine in the country was speculating the next day, whether Blaine Anderson was sleeping with yet another of his female co-stars. Fortunately, he had plenty of them on Loser Like Me.”

“So what were trying to hide?” Ari interrupted impatiently. “Drugs? I have a weed and coke guy, but if he wants something else, I’m tasking you with scoring it, understood? I have three kids. Can’t afford to go to jail for a client.”

Kurt dug his nails into the back of Santana’s chair. He really hoped it wasn’t drugs. Sure he enjoyed a joint every now and then, but he wasn’t stupid enough to buy the weed himself. His father would kill him if Kurt ever got arrested for buying drugs.

Santana smiled and shook her head. “No, seems like the boywonder likes, ah - you can’t say anything to anyone,” she interrupted herself and only continued after Kurt and Ari had both nodded, “to suck dick and his agent was trying to cover it up.”

“What?!?” Kurt exclaimed. “Blaine Anderson’s not gay. There are always girls hanging off his arms and he went to the party at the Mansion at least twice.”

Santana shrugged. “You have shitty gaydar.”

Kurt sputtered indignantly. “I’ve never even met him. How was I supposed to know he’s in the closet?”

“But that’s just it,” Santana continued, ignoring Ari’s muttered ‘that’s what I’m paying you for’. “According to the assistants at Williams PR, the guy doesn’t want to be in the closet. He wanted to come out before his career took off, but his agent convinced him not to. And ever since, the agent has made sure that no one even speculates about his client.”

Suddenly, Kurt remembered something he hadn’t thought was important before. “Uh, there’s this guy at McQuewick’s who’s been trying to get me to go out with him. He doesn’t know I work for you,” Kurt looked at Ari, “so he tells me stuff to try to impress me. And he told me last Friday, that a totally pissed off Blaine Anderson walked into the office, brandishing a copy of US weekly. Apparently, he wasn’t happy about the story linking him to Rebecca Quinn. That’s when he fired his agent.”

Ari grinned. “Looks like you two are useful after all. So here’s the one million dollar question: How do we convince Anderson that Gold Standard is the right agency for him?”

Kurt raised his hand. “You let him know that you don’t want to control his life, that he gets to make his own decisions and that you want to work with him not against him. If he comes out to you, make sure he knows you have two gay assistants. And if he comes out publicly, make sure his career doesn’t take a hit.”

“You can stay as well,” Ari decreed. “Sit down.” Kurt slid into the seat next to Santana. Ari considered Kurt for a moment. He’d never in his whole life had a homosexual thought, but he guessed that his newest hire wasn’t ugly. He turned to the girl. “Anderson, you know if he has a type?”

Santana’s grin widened and she looked straight at Kurt. “Yes, he does.”