habits aren't just made for nuns (angela) pg
title: habits aren't just made for nuns
fandom: the office
character(s)/pairing(s): angela || angela/dwight, some jim/karen, hints of angela/karen
rating: pg
word count: 710
spoilers: s3
summary: angela ticks off her flaws in her head.
You recognize that you’re an imperfect person; to claim faultlessness would be blasphemous and you’d always prided yourself in your piety. Often you take stock of your flaws, marking them off with tick-marks to be sure they’re all still there. That you’re still human.
You haven’t always gone to church every Sunday. (Tick.) There was a short period of your history, gallivanting about in college, that you’d shirked your Godly duties. You’d clung to the bed covers until ten in the morning and (God help you) to the sinful flesh sharing your bed. It was a dark time, one you care not to discuss.
You lie sometimes. (Tick.) Your name isn’t really Jane Doe; you don’t usually wear those ridiculous sunglasses. Being… intimate with Dwight makes you feel lost in a city, sensory deprived by way of an overwhelming everything. In some ways you’re grateful for it, crave the recklessness of it for small moments at a time, but in others you resist.
(Tick.)
At the heart of it all, beneath all the routine and rigid morals, you’re still lonely. Cats flocking around your feet may make you feel needed, but whiskers raking across your hand only fill up that space so much. You wish that you and Pam could be friends, that she could prove that her flaunted floozy ways wouldn’t diffuse from her to you.
(Tick.)
It’s why you steam iron you blouse and starch it twice the day the Stamford people transfer in. You’d seen the name of two women on the roster and (you barely admit it to yourself, but…) you desperately want either of them to like you.
You take immediately to the brunette one. Her suits are always clean, freshly pressed, and she’s career oriented (but not in a masculine kind of way). She doesn’t wear those short skirts that practically beg men to knock something over so she’ll bend over. She drinks her coffee with two sugars, a respectable amount. At first her heels worry you, but she never slips them off under her desk (you watch her like a hawk all day) and you relax a little.
Visions of cat parties, tea made for two and a knitting circle on Friday nights (more like a knitting line, but no matter) traipse through your head. You try to resist the temptation but a smile tugs at your lips. Karen’s been here a month, a suitable about of time to formally approach someone and request a friendship.
The brunette stands up in the corner of your eye, an empty coffee mug cupped in one hand (you can work on her caffeine intake later), as she disappears into the kitchen. You purse your lips, pushing your chair away from your desk slowly so as not to attract attention, smoothing out the stubborn wrinkles in your slacks. You flick your hair spitefully over your shoulder at Oscar and Kevin’s combined gaze, deflecting it with a flutter of your hand. You can’t say exactly why you’re behaving as though this is one of your clandestine meetings with Dwight, but your steps are quick as you make your way to the kitchen, glancing over your shoulder as you push your way in through the double-swing door.
But you stop dead in your tracks as you take in the sight before you. Karen has her hand (how did you never notice that red nail polish before?) placed firmly on Jim’s chest, the echoes of their sinful laughter pounding in your ears like hoof-beats of the four horsemen. You allow yourself one moment of shock (how could you have been such a poor judge of character?) before letting the glare settle heavy on your features.
“Excuse me.” Venom lubricates the words as they slide from your lips. You have a moment of panic when you realize that you don’t have a legitimate reason to be here, but then you head straight to the refrigerator, snatching up the apple you hadn’t intended on eating for another hour (you’re not very hungry; in fact you feel a bit ill) and storming out the door, muttering something akin to inappropriate and hussy under your breath.
You’re not without flaws. But that doesn’t mean that you have to forgive others for theirs.
…
(Tick.)
fandom: the office
character(s)/pairing(s): angela || angela/dwight, some jim/karen, hints of angela/karen
rating: pg
word count: 710
spoilers: s3
summary: angela ticks off her flaws in her head.
You recognize that you’re an imperfect person; to claim faultlessness would be blasphemous and you’d always prided yourself in your piety. Often you take stock of your flaws, marking them off with tick-marks to be sure they’re all still there. That you’re still human.
You haven’t always gone to church every Sunday. (Tick.) There was a short period of your history, gallivanting about in college, that you’d shirked your Godly duties. You’d clung to the bed covers until ten in the morning and (God help you) to the sinful flesh sharing your bed. It was a dark time, one you care not to discuss.
You lie sometimes. (Tick.) Your name isn’t really Jane Doe; you don’t usually wear those ridiculous sunglasses. Being… intimate with Dwight makes you feel lost in a city, sensory deprived by way of an overwhelming everything. In some ways you’re grateful for it, crave the recklessness of it for small moments at a time, but in others you resist.
(Tick.)
At the heart of it all, beneath all the routine and rigid morals, you’re still lonely. Cats flocking around your feet may make you feel needed, but whiskers raking across your hand only fill up that space so much. You wish that you and Pam could be friends, that she could prove that her flaunted floozy ways wouldn’t diffuse from her to you.
(Tick.)
It’s why you steam iron you blouse and starch it twice the day the Stamford people transfer in. You’d seen the name of two women on the roster and (you barely admit it to yourself, but…) you desperately want either of them to like you.
You take immediately to the brunette one. Her suits are always clean, freshly pressed, and she’s career oriented (but not in a masculine kind of way). She doesn’t wear those short skirts that practically beg men to knock something over so she’ll bend over. She drinks her coffee with two sugars, a respectable amount. At first her heels worry you, but she never slips them off under her desk (you watch her like a hawk all day) and you relax a little.
Visions of cat parties, tea made for two and a knitting circle on Friday nights (more like a knitting line, but no matter) traipse through your head. You try to resist the temptation but a smile tugs at your lips. Karen’s been here a month, a suitable about of time to formally approach someone and request a friendship.
The brunette stands up in the corner of your eye, an empty coffee mug cupped in one hand (you can work on her caffeine intake later), as she disappears into the kitchen. You purse your lips, pushing your chair away from your desk slowly so as not to attract attention, smoothing out the stubborn wrinkles in your slacks. You flick your hair spitefully over your shoulder at Oscar and Kevin’s combined gaze, deflecting it with a flutter of your hand. You can’t say exactly why you’re behaving as though this is one of your clandestine meetings with Dwight, but your steps are quick as you make your way to the kitchen, glancing over your shoulder as you push your way in through the double-swing door.
But you stop dead in your tracks as you take in the sight before you. Karen has her hand (how did you never notice that red nail polish before?) placed firmly on Jim’s chest, the echoes of their sinful laughter pounding in your ears like hoof-beats of the four horsemen. You allow yourself one moment of shock (how could you have been such a poor judge of character?) before letting the glare settle heavy on your features.
“Excuse me.” Venom lubricates the words as they slide from your lips. You have a moment of panic when you realize that you don’t have a legitimate reason to be here, but then you head straight to the refrigerator, snatching up the apple you hadn’t intended on eating for another hour (you’re not very hungry; in fact you feel a bit ill) and storming out the door, muttering something akin to inappropriate and hussy under your breath.
You’re not without flaws. But that doesn’t mean that you have to forgive others for theirs.
…
(Tick.)