Title: The List
Rating: K
Disclaimer: I don't own Mindy or Paul or thair fabulous multi-culi lovechild that exists only in my warped imagination. Oh, wait, I guess I do own that last one.
A/N: It's a Thanksgiving miracle! No, seriously, I was so blown away by "The Next Time You Go Away" garnering unexpected reviews by people outside my normal Toby-centric circle that I decided to post this little number right away. Timing is non-specific, really. It was intended to be Season 4-ish, but could just as easily be post-"Frame Toby."
At first, yeah, she feels sorry for him. He's like this kicked puppy or something. So it's kind of her charity thing to maybe cheer him up a little. Because Kelly hates it when people are gloomy all the time. Like Pam. Hello, she's one of the hottest girls in the office--granted, it's a contest of two, but still--and she goes around in pastels and weird little insincere smiles. What's with that?
Toby just kind of tolerates it when she talks to him, but he does kind of listen. She knows she talks too much, but she gets lonely back in her little corner and the words just bubble out like a Coke someone's been shaking. And she kind of feels dumb, but she just can't really stop. No one really listens anyway, so she figures it doesn't really matter.
Mostly Toby kind of nods. But sometimes she gets the feeling that he's happy not to have to spend lunch alone, especially when Jim and Pam are being gooey with each other at the next table.
Sometimes she tries to get him to talk, because she gets a little sick of one-sided conversations, and sometimes he actually does talk. And even though he's smarter than her, he doesn't talk over her head like he thinks he's so much better than her. She likes that he's considerate like that.
It feels like a game to her sometimes, like she's compiling a list of facts about Toby Flenderson. Like she's a secret journalist.
Toby actually likes to cook, unlike every other man she's ever known. He reads weird poetry she's never heard of, and listens to mopey music she's also never heard of. He was super-proud of his daughter Sasha. He hates barbeque flavored chips. He'd won two marathons. He has red-green colorblindness, which might account for his total lack of fashion sense.
It occurs to her one day, when they're sitting together at what she likes to call "the cool kids table" and she steals one of his pretzel sticks and he just kind of looks at her and almost smiles, that she doesn't feel sorry for him anymore, and that feeling that way kind of distracted her from who he is.
She doesn't think anyone else would feel sorry for him, either, if they got to know him.