FIC: You Take What You Get (The Office, Tim/Dawn)
Title: You Take What You Get
Fandom/Pairing: The Office (UK); Tim/Dawn
Rating: G
For the_avril_game
***
Dawn's mum mails her a tape of the documentary when it airs, as they don't get the BBC in Florida. Not even BBC America - Lee's sister's cable company doesn't carry it. Dawn doesn't particularly mind, most days. American television is much better anyway - the actors are prettier, the shows are more expensive, and they get the episodes weeks before Britain does. She likes CSI and Scrubs.
She looks at the tape and thinks about Slough, and gets a sick, sad feeling. She and Tim promised to write, but neither of them have, and she puts the tape on the top shelf in her closet and tries to forget about it.
She remembers the way Tim's fingers shook when he was trying to turn off his microphone, and how when he asked her to stay she thought, wildly, but we've already bought the tickets to America, everything's settled. She's been with Lee since they were fifteen. That should count for something, shouldn't it?
Florida is sunny and the air is thick and hot, and everywhere is air-conditioned so that you need a sweater to go to the movies in the summer (they call jumpers "sweaters" here, she tries hard to remember), and it could not be less like Slough. They're happy here, she thinks, more or less. As happy as anywhere.
The only thing is, she doesn't have much to do. She spends a lot of time cleaning, and minding the baby, and tries to draw some, even though Lee says it's a waste of time. One afternoon she's reorganizing their closet, and there's the tape, labeled neatly in her mum's round handwriting - The Office, BBC.
She taps it against the shelf and feels nostalgic and takes it to the living room, puts it in the VCR. Still kneeling on the carpet, she hits the power button on the TV, and the tape's already playing automatically, in the middle of a scene. It must have been stopped near the end, because there's Keith in Ali G gear, giving her advice on fanny packs in America, and there's Gareth, hopping on one foot and yelling at Tim for hiding all his belongings, and she's sitting back on the floor, laughing so hard it's almost like crying, and missing Tim and Gareth and that whole horrible job so much it actually hurts.
Then on the screen she's got those ridiculous flowers in her hair, and Tim puts a quid in the bowl for the kissing booth and isn't even going to kiss her, and she remembers the feel of his lapels in her hands, the texture of the material, and it was all so fast, and watching it now she sees that he didn't close his eyes while she was kissing him, not for a second, and his lips were slightly chapped, and the whole rest of the day they couldn't even look at each other, and.
And she went to America, and life's like this, it's not about imaginary chances, and she has Lee, and she's going to be sensible about it.
***
END
Fandom/Pairing: The Office (UK); Tim/Dawn
Rating: G
For the_avril_game
***
Dawn's mum mails her a tape of the documentary when it airs, as they don't get the BBC in Florida. Not even BBC America - Lee's sister's cable company doesn't carry it. Dawn doesn't particularly mind, most days. American television is much better anyway - the actors are prettier, the shows are more expensive, and they get the episodes weeks before Britain does. She likes CSI and Scrubs.
She looks at the tape and thinks about Slough, and gets a sick, sad feeling. She and Tim promised to write, but neither of them have, and she puts the tape on the top shelf in her closet and tries to forget about it.
She remembers the way Tim's fingers shook when he was trying to turn off his microphone, and how when he asked her to stay she thought, wildly, but we've already bought the tickets to America, everything's settled. She's been with Lee since they were fifteen. That should count for something, shouldn't it?
Florida is sunny and the air is thick and hot, and everywhere is air-conditioned so that you need a sweater to go to the movies in the summer (they call jumpers "sweaters" here, she tries hard to remember), and it could not be less like Slough. They're happy here, she thinks, more or less. As happy as anywhere.
The only thing is, she doesn't have much to do. She spends a lot of time cleaning, and minding the baby, and tries to draw some, even though Lee says it's a waste of time. One afternoon she's reorganizing their closet, and there's the tape, labeled neatly in her mum's round handwriting - The Office, BBC.
She taps it against the shelf and feels nostalgic and takes it to the living room, puts it in the VCR. Still kneeling on the carpet, she hits the power button on the TV, and the tape's already playing automatically, in the middle of a scene. It must have been stopped near the end, because there's Keith in Ali G gear, giving her advice on fanny packs in America, and there's Gareth, hopping on one foot and yelling at Tim for hiding all his belongings, and she's sitting back on the floor, laughing so hard it's almost like crying, and missing Tim and Gareth and that whole horrible job so much it actually hurts.
Then on the screen she's got those ridiculous flowers in her hair, and Tim puts a quid in the bowl for the kissing booth and isn't even going to kiss her, and she remembers the feel of his lapels in her hands, the texture of the material, and it was all so fast, and watching it now she sees that he didn't close his eyes while she was kissing him, not for a second, and his lips were slightly chapped, and the whole rest of the day they couldn't even look at each other, and.
And she went to America, and life's like this, it's not about imaginary chances, and she has Lee, and she's going to be sensible about it.
***
END