Chapter Text
Keeley waltzed into Rebecca’s office just as she always had. Flouncing in, talking a mile a minute. Going on and on about one of her newest clients and all the highs and woes that came with them, all before dramatically flopping to the couch with a body-shaking sigh.
She peeked out of the corner of her eye over to where Rebecca sat. Wondering if she’d caught her attention with the overdramatised spectacle she’d swept in with and she couldn’t help the way her lips lifted in response to what she saw.
Keeley giggled pausing all pretences for a moment. Finding herself unable to hold back her shimmering smile at the bemused smirk Rebecca happened to be shooting her way from across that marvellously monstrous desk of hers.
Keeley snapped back into character as she fell back into another woeful huff before demanding, “I think we should go out and get absolutely blasted at boozy brunch!”
Rebecca’s attention turned back to her laptop as she continued typing as if Keeley hadn’t said a word, but yet…her smile remained.
Rebecca spoke in a playfully sarcastic tone as she replied, “Hello Keeley, lovely to see you too. Oh me? Oh, I'm doing wonderfully today. Thank you for asking.”
Keeley grinned wider at her friend's tone, loving when Rebecca was feeling playful, as she sang, “yeah yeah, all of that. So…whatcha say, babe?”
Rebecca glanced back at her over the rim of those glasses that made her look remarkably like a sexy school teacher, which she’d seemingly started wearing more and more as of late, and gave a deadpan expression as she airily inquired, “about what?”
Keeley let out yet another overly dramatic whoosh of a breath as she slumped deeper into the couch before abruptly springing up to her full height, remarkably gracefully considering the six-inch platforms that adorned her feet, before launching into her pitch, “boozy brunch babe!”
Rebecca raised an eyebrow at her over the rim of those magical glasses, somehow making her even fucking hotter while simultaneously causing Keeley to freeze in awe for what was probably more than a moment. Breaking free of the distraction Keeley refocused, “come on you lovely librarian, you! Let's go get sloshed on overpriced mimosas at 11 am!”
Rebecca chuckled, gesturing back down to her desk as she said, “Keeley, I have work to do and I’m fairly sure that despite your presence in my office, when you no longer work here might I add, you do too.”
Keeley grumbled at Rebecca’s resistance, “oh come on babe! It's a Friday and there isn’t a game this weekend, so there is no pre-game prep or anything to do! And you're the fucking boss! And I'm also, the fucking boss! So let's both just blow off work and go get bloody sloshed!”
Rebecca was looking at her now, seemingly entertaining her demand causing Keeley to vibrate with anticipation but all came to a screeching halt as their attention was drawn to a tentative knock on the door.
Keeley glanced at the door wondering if she’d heard a sound at all only to turn back to face Rebecca and frown immediately. Gone was the playful look on her friend's face, now replaced with something strained.
Keeley watched as Rebecca glanced down at her watch, seemingly confirming something she apparently already knew, before she choked out, “come in,” in the direction of the intrusion of their conversation.
A beat passed as Keeley assessed Rebecca only to turn and see Ted slowly entering the room.
Keeley frowned once more as she watched the usually bubbly and energetic Ted entering the room with eyes downcast, shoulders hitched high and body tense.
Ted failed to meet Rebecca’s eye, instead focusing on the floor as he clutched the little pink box in his hand, tight enough to cause the cardboard to crinkle, just so.
Ted walked towards them slowly, without a single word only to glance up once he reached the desk. Keeley could see him taking a breath and frowned further when she recognised that he was seemingly gathering the courage to speak.
When had Ted ever needed to take a moment before launching into the conversation?
Keeley glanced back to Rebecca noting that her friend was once again refocused on her laptop, instead of the man standing tentatively in front of her, refusing to tear her eyes away from it as if that would incite some horrible catastrophe.
…This was weird.
Keeley watched as Rebecca and Ted quickly glanced at each other before instantly averting their eyes as twin blushes bloomed across their cheeks.
Ted cleared his throat roughly as he swiftly placed the little pink box down on Rebecca’s desk muttering a strained, “Mornin Boss,” before cringing a little, at what Keeley was unsure.
This was super weird.
Rebecca let out a slightly breathless, “morning Ted,” as she continued to steadfastly refuse to look at anything but her laptop.
Keeley glanced between them noting the awkward air that Ted’s presence had created and the fact that neither of them seemed to be able to look at one another and her frown deepened.
She ignored the fact that neither Ted nor Rebecca failed to even acknowledge her presence in the room since that oh-so-tentative knock, instead waiting in bated breath as she watched this situation unfold.
Whatever was happening here was not only weird as fuck but it was painfully intriguing to observe.
Keeley glanced back to Rebecca once more expecting to see her already halfway through a biscuit, chewing away happily with any awkwardness tossed out the window upon the remedy of her biscuits but found that she hadn’t moved an inch.
Rebecca who usually snapped her biscuits up immediately upon arrival, never even allowing them to touch anything but her hands, left them alone sitting on her desk unopened and out of place amongst the stark emptiness that surrounded them.
Ted nodded once, seemingly to himself, as he continued to look at the ground muttering, “well, that’s uh…biscuits…so um…imma go… downstairs, now.”
He rubbed the back of his neck as he pointed over his shoulder to the door as if he needed a visual aid, even though Rebecca wasn’t looking, before waiting a moment, for what Keeley wasn’t sure, and finally spinning on the spot and doing as he said.
Ted paused at the door, one final time, hand clutching the doorframe tightly as he continued to avoid looking directly at Rebecca before he cleared his throat and uttered, “uh…see ya later…”
Ted waited for one more beat to hear a strained sound from Rebecca’s direction, apparently in response to his departure and then as suddenly as he had entered he was gone, shutting the door behind him and leaving Keeley to go over one of the strangest interactions she’d ever witnessed.
…
Keeley looked at where Ted had stood with complete confusion before slowly turning back to Rebecca.
Keeley blinked hard as she came face to face with Rebecca once again and felt the need to rub her eyes and gape at what she saw.
Rebecca seemed to be looking at her again as if everything was normal as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred and she and Ted hadn't just been swapped out for two incredibly awkward but still fucking fit alien beings for the past few minutes. Keeley’s mouth then did drop open, completely involuntarily.
Keeley gave Rebecca a look conveying her thoughts but Rebecca just blankly questioned, “what?”
Keeley’s head wildly flicked back and forth from the door to Rebecca, to where Ted had been and finally back to Rebecca as she incredulously repeated, “what do you mean what?! What the fuck was that?!”
All thoughts of boozy brunch were gone as Keeley’s sole purpose now was to figure out this compelling mystery.
Rebecca blinked at her owlishly and Keeley felt the frustration rise within her. “Rebeccaaaa,” she whined leadingly but Rebecca only blinked blankly at her as if she had no idea what Keeley was trying to say.
After what felt like too long Rebecca sighed exasperatedly and Keeley reared back as Rebecca acted as if Keeley was the one acting fucking weird, confirming this attitude by saying, “Keeley darling, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Keeley let out an indignant squeak before she cracked, feeling like a cartoon bomb that had just run out of lit fuse. “That! You and Ted! That was super fucking weird!” She squealed.
“No, it wasn’t.” Rebecca deflected.
Keeley scoffed, “oh yes! It totally was!”
Rebecca raised an eyebrow at her and Keeley squeaked, “you couldn’t even look at him!”
“I looked at him.” Rebecca defended, finally starting to show the cracks in her facade.
“For like a second!” Keeley conceded, “And he couldn’t look at you either! Which for the man that spends all his time shooting heart eyes at you is, again, super fucking weird!”
That seemed to catch Rebecca off guard as she sputtered, “he does not…I mean…he never…and he did…he looked at me!” She finished lamely in what she hoped was a good defence before Keeley broke it down.
“Againnnn, only for like a second before you both got fucking weird and started blushing like two bashful fucking schoolgirls!”
Rebecca seemingly had nothing to say to that as she clenched her jaw shut and stared at Keeley.
A beat of silence passed before Keeley stressed, “you haven’t even touched your biscuits! And now I'm wondering if you’ve been body snatched by some Ted-fearing, biscuit-ignoring, still super fucking fit alien!”
Rebecca blinked down at her biscuits, not reaching for them as she usually would but glowering at them instead.
Rebecca took a deep breath, glancing back up at Keeley and sighing as she fell back into her chair.
Keeley watched as Rebecca closed her eyes and groaned deeply. Keeley swiftly planted herself into the chair facing Rebecca, resting her elbows on the desk and leaning in, engrossed in whatever Rebecca had to say about what just happened.
Rebecca blinked her eyes open, looking past Keeley to the doorway before she turned back to her friends and let out a defeated huff, “it was weird. Wasn’t it?”
Keeley scoffed, catching Rebecca’s look of annoyance before softening her features and trying to hold back too much of her I told you so tone, as she confirmed, “uh, yeah, babe. Super fucking weird.”
Rebecca groaned once more as she explained, “I thought we’d be able to go on like normal, you know? that we’d be able to pretend nothing happened but the whole week has been like that…and it’s not getting better.”
Keeley leant further in, obviously intrigued but feeling lost in the missing details that she desperately desired.
“Babbbbeee….” She drew out in what she hoped would be a convincing tone, “what happened between you and Ted?”
If she leant even more into Rebecca’s space Rebecca didn't comment on it, instead choosing to raise a critical eye at her obviously eager friend.
Rebecca took a moment trying to think of a way out of this, a way to pretend that nothing was going on but then deflated when she came up blank. She supposed that she needed to speak to someone about this and with the way things were going she certainly wasn’t going to be talking to Ted.
Rebecca sighed deeply letting all pretences go as she turned to Keeley, “okay, but it cannot leave this room.”
Keeley’s eyes widened and her smile brightened despite Rebecca’s wary look as she shifted in anticipation, confirming, “yeah sure babe, whatever you say.”
Rebecca eyed her critically before she stressed, “I'm serious Keeley. You can’t tell anyone…not even Roy.”
Keeley reared back at that.
This must be serious.
Keeley mulled over those words for a moment oscillating wildly between her need for gossip and details and the knowledge that keeping anything at all from Roy would be incredibly hard and she huffed in her conundrum.
Keeley looked like she was going to argue for a mere second but the look in Rebecca’s eyes left no room for anything but agreement.
Keeley swallowed down her argument, following her desire for details and conceded, “Okay babe, despite the great personal effort that that will take on my part, I promise not to tell Roy whatever salacious secret you have that has your eye doing that nervous twitchy thing that is just soooo cute.”
Rebecca frowned lifting her hand to lightly tap around her eye as she scowled at Keeley before dropping her hand and letting out a heavy breath.
Rebecca glanced back up to Keeley to find the woman somehow even nearer than before and with a quick glance at the still closed door she let out a breathless, “okay…”
Keeley waited patiently as Rebecca looked at her before letting out a rushed, “Tedandimayhaveseeneachothernaked.”
Keeley blinked, trying to comprehend Rebecca’s breath of a sentence before she gave up furrowing her brows and let out a confused, “what?”
Rebecca sighed, straightening up in her seat and looking away from Keeley as she said more concisely, “Ted and I may have seen each other…naked.”
Keeley froze before confirming, “may have? Or did?”
Rebecca blushed yet answered honestly, “we did.”
Rebecca waited for Keeley to say something, anything else but the air in the room remained stilted as Keeley processed her newfound fact.
A beat passed and Keeley succinctly nodded her head just once, in a manner that held more assurance than Rebecca ever thought she’d be able to truly muster, before she confidently concluded, “so you shagged Ted?”
Keeley turned to Rebecca waiting for her confirmation but found nothing of the type. Her brows pulled together and her confidence began to wane as she took in the way that Rebecca reared back violently as if she’d just been slapped.
Keeley frowned at Rebecca’s overly dramatic reaction and her confusion only deepened as Rebecca let out a scandalised, “No!”
Keeley’s brows furrowed and she was about to enquire more when Rebecca’s face turned completive and she whispered, “at least I don’t think we did.”
Keeley’s eyebrows flew into her high pointed hairline at that as she squeaked, “what do you mean you don’t think you did?! Wouldn’t you know if you shagged Ted?!”
Rebecca blushed deeply as she thought about it. She stared at the desk as her brows knitted together before she confidently stated, “yes. Yes! I am sure. I didn't shag Ted,” only for her confidence to wane a moment later as Keeley watched her question her own statement.
Keeley was lost. Understanding nothing but the fact that she had to be missing quite a few details regarding whether or not her friends shagged and finding herself desperate to piece together this ever-enthralling puzzle. Keeley took a deep breath, letting it woos out of her as if it held every ounce of confusion that could possibly have left her body before she sat back, swishing down in her chair and letting the scant information that she did have sink in.
“Okay babe,” Keeley started, “this is getting super confusing so I'm gonna need you to back up a bit and tell me what happened.” Rebecca looked reluctant yet reassured before Keeley added, “then I can tell you whether or not you shagged Ted.”
Rebecca’s eyes blew wide.
Rebecca mulled it over before she sighed heavily and said, “okay…” taking a deep breath and launching into the story.