Tammy Edwards loves with her entire being.
She’s always been like that. Younger, smaller, that devoutly Catholic girl brushing her hair back when she saw one of her many hallway crushes, or sat behind that cute guy in almost every class in year eleven, or would walk out to school accidentally at the same time as her neighbor from across the street.
Tammy has always had a crush. For as long she can remember. Elementary, middle, high school, every family vacation and camp. Which means she falls in love easily – her crushes change within days, brain always seeking the serotonin of watching someone else be the perfect one to Tammy.
Which is why she’s in a state of constant meltdown over her hopeless crush on her co-worker, Penny Lamb.
From the moment she saw her coming into her first day, nervously placing her ID card on the counter, Tammy has been head over heels for her. Penny – Penny, such a beautiful name, for a beautiful girl, oh god, she’s being mushy again – at first shared an office with a few other guys fresh from training. The door is right in front of Tammy’s desk, so she has more than a few occasions to look at all of them.
Penny is the most memorable one. Dark, chin-length hair, hands moving, fiddling with her bracelets or the necklace she always wears, confident moves, voice loud and clear. She’s a natural leader, and where all of the interns belong is clearly and quickly established.
In the end, eight weeks of internship later, only her and two others remain. Two stop showing up, one dies during a case and one is fired because, said by one of their supervisors, Bramshaw, “who the fuck let a wimp like that through training.”
(Really, you’d be surprised how little shame the higher-ups have. Tammy shouldn’t know half of the information she does, all because none of them know how to keep their private conversations private.)
Every day, without fail, Penny shows up and puts her ID on the counter with that one-sided smirk that makes Tammy’s insides go into early stages of organ failure. She has dimples, for God’s sake, and Tammy is only a weak woman. And she looks good even in their awful work clothes, a plain baby blue shirt that Tammy has never seen anyone look good in before Penny, and dark blue bell-bottoms.
This is worse than her usual crushes. She can deal with them, looking until they inevitably wash away. Just throw herself into church, or work, and forget.
Her crush on Penny just grows stronger with every glance she steals. Penny shines in the morning sun, glows in the afternoon beam. Even when she comes back after a case, all disheveled and bone-tired and sweaty, she’s the prettiest being in all universes. And it’s not like Tammy can just separate herself. They work across each other, and with how much Penny is willing to run around with documents, she is a constant presence on Tammy's mind.
It’s horrible. Truly horrible, stomach-twisting, gut-wrenching, migraine-inducing horrible. Even the beads on her rosary start to remind her of Penny, because they’re pink, and Penny’s cheeks also glow pink when it’s cold outside, or when she's laughing at some joke. They go red like cherub’s, and Tammy wants so desperately to be the cause of it.
She tries to smack some sense into herself. “Come on, Tabitha Edwards. You’re a grown, adult woman, get over this stupid schoolgirl crush and do your work like a responsible person. You can do it! You can do it!”
Then she walks into the office, takes one look at Penny’s dreamy face and black nail polish-painted fingernails sliding her ID, and falls in love all over again.
It’s an early Wednesday morning, before the office officially opens, and Tammy is sorting through the pile of papers that accumulated since she closed yesterday. She’s so busy trying to decipher her coworker’s chicken scratch on a blue sticky note she doesn’t even notice soft padding towards her desk.
(Yeah, working in a government agency dealing with supernatural shit she should’ve been more aware of her surroundings. Woodard just has horrible handwriting, that’s all.)
“Hi.”
Her heart stops, and she whips her head up so fast she probably gives herself spinal damage.
Penny is standing there, in all her glory. The sun shines from behind her, giving her dark hair an aureola of orange-yellow light, and her green, forest and emerald and fresh grass, green eyes glimmer, and if she keeps the steady eye contact Tammy Edwards will drop dead on the tile floor of their office.
“Oh, hi Penny.” She manages to stutter out, and immediately regrets it. Penny leans over the counter casually, propping up on her elbows, like she isn’t shaking Tammy’s entire world up. Pretty girl? Talking to her?
Jesus, she might’ve passed out a little.
“Want to go out for a coffee with me? This lunch break?”
Our Father, Who art in heaven, Hallowed be Thy Name–
Tammy is nodding before she fully processes the words, and then breaks into hysterical stammer, “Definitely! I mean, if- if you want to, I don’t want you to- to– think you are obligated, because you aren’t, God, I’m- No, no, I didn’t– I didn’t mean it like that–”
She’s never wanted to melt into the ground more. Not even when she asked out Tyler Perkins in seventh grade and he told her no in the most awkward, nice-guy way possible while their entire Advanced English class watched.
Penny just chuckles, dimples coming out. Tammy feels her body physically melting. “No, I’d be glad if you did.” She leans in even closer, as if the walls had I thought you hated me, honestly.”
“Hated you?” Every single emotion ravages through Tammy’s body at the same time, and her mouth gets tingly with shock. “No, why– why would you do that?”
“You’re always staring at me.” No, she noticed! It’s the high time for a bus to crash into the building. Really. Please.
“It’s just that!–” Tammy's voice breaks pitifully, and starts flailing her arms around, as if she is trying to shoo away her impending doom. Penny is just playing a prank on her, surely, has an invisible camera or something and the entire facility, entire Canada will soon see Tammy’s absolute meltdown in high quality. “No, I– I’m sorry, you– I– I didn’t mean to stare, you’re just–”
Fortunately, by some higher power, Penny takes mercy on her and leans back. “So. Noon? I think that’s when you have your lunch break?”
Tammy nods with such vigor it makes her look like a bobble head dog. She doesn’t even question why Penny knows her schedule. “Sure. Yeah. Absolutely.”
Penny just smirks, one-sided and dimpled, and walks away from the counter, Tammy’s eyes warily following her to the door of her offi– Did she just make finger guns at her?
Tammy feels her chest expand with that all too familiar feeling of cotton.
God, it might be the best Wednesday ever.