Title: Circle of Isolation Author: Kelly Keil (kellylynn73@comcast.net) Website: www.geocities.com/kellychenault73 Rating: Um. PG. I suppose. Category: V, A Pairing: Kim (Arlene)/Skinner Spoilers: The Truth. Which I haven't seen but have had described to me. So what I get wrong, blame Kristen2K. Har har har. Disclaimer: The whole lot of them can bite my ass. There. I've now earned my PG rating. Summary: She is the best damn secretary ever. Author's notes: Okay. So blame KristenK2. All her fault. Literally. Thanks for the drive-by beta, hon. I do appreciate it. Oh, and hell has officially frozen over, because I'm posting Skinnerfic. ---- Circle of Isolation By Kelly Keil They giggle about her in the bathroom. She has caught them at it. The other secretaries, magpies clustered at the sinks, all dressed in slimming black and dark gray. They put on lipstick and touch up mascara, and their eyes follow her in the mirror as she chooses the stall farthest away from them. She has heard the whispers and understands that somehow she is no longer part of their group. She knows that it's because of her boss, and the things her boss does. She isn't supposed to know, but she does. She is his secretary, and she knows more about him than he knows about himself. That's her job, and she's always prided herself on being the best at what she does. Besides, she's broken the cardinal rule of her profession, and the other secretaries know that, too, smelling it on her like only one's peers can. It's why she tolerates the whispers and refuses to give into self-pity when she sits alone in a circle of isolation in the commissary. She has dared to feel something other than professional respect for her boss. She has, in fact, been foolish enough to fall quite stupidly in love with him. It wasn't something she ever expected, and it snuck up on her with stealthy soft feet she couldn't sense until it was far too late. By degrees she went from admiration to devotion, and didn't even realize what had happened until she looked at him one day and nearly blurted out the shameful truth right there. He'd seemed so broken down and tired and not the man she was used to seeing. It hurt her with a power she wasn't expecting, and she'd had to grip her desk, her knuckles white with effort, to hold her back from throwing herself at him right then and there. <'I'll make it better, *let* me make it better.'> And that last, horrible, wonderful thought: <'Please.'> But she said nothing and brought him his coffee and his files and made sure he wasn't disturbed for the whole day. It was a small enough service, but it was her only way to support him, and so support him she did, in the only way she was able. She is the best damn secretary ever. It's all very sad, of course. The other secretaries are right to mock her as they freshen up their lipstick and eat their low-fat lunches. She needs to swallow this childish infatuation and be the professional that she knows herself to be. If the rumors are true, her boss is in deep, deep trouble, and she has to think of herself. What will become of her if he somehow topples? Never mind that her brain refuses to believe that he could fall. She is in love, but even before she acknowledged that, she knew what sort of man he was. <*Is*>, she reminds herself. Rumors, no matter how they twist in the pit of her stomach, are merely that. Rumors, hearsay, and talk. Wishful thinking. Sour grapes. She knows the worth of her boss. She has ticked off each of his virtues while lying in bed before sleep. She has counted them off while sitting in a bathroom stall waiting for the whispers to subside, allowing her a somewhat graceful exit. He is good. He is decent. He is perfect. No, no he isn't. But... She shakes off the useless inner argument. She's repeated the words to herself too many times before. She fears that she is inconsequential to him. That he sees her as furniture. Useful furniture, to be sure, like the computer, but furniture nevertheless. She is a fixture, like the electric pencil sharpener. She is decretive, like the vanilla art print on the wall. She is standard equipment, like the uncomfortable seats the agents sit in to wait for him. In her deepest, darkest heart of hearts, she is more than half convinced that he can't help but see her as an interchangeable part in a machine that wants to swallow him whole and spit out his bones. But... He told her to run. And there had been a wild look in his eyes. But she is a very good secretary, and she won't run from her duty. And she is in love with him, and can't run from her heart. So she sits, long into the night, waiting from him to return from Deputy Director Kersh's office. Lights are turned off all around her, and she sits alone at her desk in her own private glow. And she waits for her boss. Because she is a very good secretary. End