The wine is good, the shrimp is excellent, and she successfully fooled her boyfriend into thinking that she’d slept with half of her male coworkers.

 

Karen decides that, all in all, it’s a pretty fun cocktail party.

 

After finally extricating herself from an incredibly awkward conversation with Jan in which the words “vodka” and “aspirin” are mentioned multiple times, she’s relieved to see Jim reenter the house.

 

He’s smiling and his hair is slightly tousled from the physical activity. She loves that hair. When he notices her, his smile grows into a big, goofy grin, and Karen can’t help returning it with one of her own.

 

She is so in love with this man.

 

It isn’t like her to get so invested this quickly. She is always the one in relationships accused of having a “commitment problem.” She hates guys who try to celebrate weekly anniversaries. She doesn’t “meet the parents” unless it’s been at least eight months (and even then, only grudgingly). And frankly, she thinks that flowers are a waste of money. They just wilt within a week anyway. She’ll take a copy of the newest strategy guide for Call of Duty over a dozen roses any day.

 

If she called up any one of her ex-boyfriends and told them that she moved to Scranton, Pennsylvania for a guy she’d been dating for less than a week they would have assumed it was a very strange prank call.

 

There is just something so freeing about being with him. He can make anything fun. He’s one of those people that just lights up a room. He brings out the best in her, makes her feel funny and appreciated and brilliant. It’s impossible not to love him.

 

She supposes that’s the problem.

 

The image of two sombrero-ed figures huddled together and giggling over a patch of broken drywall creeps into her thoughts before she can stop it.

 

She promised herself that she wouldn’t think those thoughts tonight, but it’s like when she knows that there’s a mosquito in the room. She can never totally enjoy herself, because she knows that damn mosquito is there, waiting to bite her. She might forget it for a while, but then she catches a glimpse of it out of the corner of her eye and she’s on edge again. She could just wait and swat it, but honestly, it’s just a harmless little mosquito and it’s not its fault that it likes blood. That usually doesn’t stop Karen from killing it anyway, but she still feels a little guilty about it.

 

Jim successfully draws her thoughts away from mosquitoes and sombreros by pulling her in and giving her an exuberant kiss on the lips.

 

“What was that for?” Karen exclaims happily as they pull apart.

 

“I’m just happy,” he says, and it’s obvious that he’s telling the truth.

 

She’s gotten very good at being able to tell when he’s honestly happy. There have been times, occurring with increasing frequency, when he says he’s happy but she can tell he doesn’t mean it.

 

“So I take it basketball went well?” she asks him, smirking.

 

“Well first of all, you were right,” Jim says grimly. “He’s so not over you.”

 

“I warned you,” she replies, shaking her head sadly. “I’m irresistible.”

 

“Obviously,” he says.

 

He grins again, and the mosquitoes that she thought she saw fluttering around the room take their leave.

 

“So, come on. What happened?” she prods.

 

“Nothing, really. I mean, he didn’t offer me a promotion or anything.”

 

“Well damn it. I’ve been wasting my time on you Halpert. I was just biding my time until I could use your heightened power within Dunder-Mifflin to get some real perks,” she says.

 

“I would think that just basking in my presence is enough of a perk,” he replies, feigning indignation.

 

“As far as basking goes, I’ve had better,” she says nonchalantly.

 

He nudges her with his elbow, causing her to giggle. That’s another thing.

 

She giggles when he’s around.

 

Karen Filippelli is not a giggler. She laughs. She occasionally guffaws. She’s even been known to snort sometimes when she’s had a bit to drink. Yet when she’s around him every now and then it just slips out. It always surprises her. She momentarily wonders where that strange noise is coming from until she realizes her own mouth is the source.

 

Jim smiles again and throws an arm around her shoulders.

 

“I don’t know. He just turned out to be a really cool guy. I wasn’t expecting to have a good time tonight,” he muses.

 

And just like that, the mosquitoes are back.

 

She knows he doesn’t mean it as a slight against her, but it hurts just the same. She had been looking forward to tonight. She knew that she’d have fun just because he was there. Apparently he wasn’t so sure.

 

“Well, I’m glad you did,” she says, covering up the hurt with a smile. She’s gotten used to doing that.

 

“So, I figure I can’t top this. The night can only go downhill from here. If we stay any longer we run a serious risk of undoing any good that has occurred,” he says, unwrapping his arm from around her and tugging at her hands.

 

She looks at him incredulously.

 

“What could undo the good?” she asks.

 

At that very second, her answer arrives in the form of Michael Scott. He sidles nervously up to Jim, shooting an anxious glance at the camera before speaking.

 

“Hey, Jimbag, I’m in desperate need of some man-help,” he says in an exaggerated whisper.

 

“Man-help? Like… Michael, please tell me this doesn’t in any way involve… man parts,” Jim says with a mixture of horror and amusement evident on his face.

 

“No—what? No! It’s Jan. There’s something seriously wrong with her. She’s like an animal or a sex-addict or something! I think she’s a necrophiliac.” He pauses to consider his statement before adding, “I wonder if that’s covered under the company’s insurance plan.”

 

Jim’s eyes get as wide as saucers and he looks into the camera with a barely concealed smile when he replies.

 

“I seriously doubt it.”

 

“I just don’t know what to do,” Michael says miserably. He sounds like he might be on the verge of tears. His voice is choked with emotion.

 

Jim looks at Michael and seems to soften. Karen loves this about him too. He doesn’t have a mean bone in his body.

 

“You know who would be the perfect person to ask for advice? Dwight. He’s been dating his girlfriend for a while now.”

 

Michael screws up his face in disgust.

 

“Oh—gross! Dwight would have no idea what I’m going through.”

 

“Okay, first of all, you don’t know that. Dwight’s girlfriend could be a sex maniac.”

 

Karen shudders and Jim can’t hide his grin when she clutches his hand even tighter.

 

“Ew, God! No way! I don’t even want to think about that! Just—Jim, come on man. You two must… you know,” Michael mumbles, gesturing vaguely at the Jim and Karen. “Both good-looking consenting adults in a monogam… monogrammed relationship. You probably… You get freaky all the time, right?”

 

“Oh my God,” Karen mutters.

 

“Ooookay, Michael. The last time I saw Dwight he was on the roof. I think you should go find him. Karen and I were just about to leave anyway.”

 

“Fine. But just… if you see Jan just don’t mention anything—the necrophilia or anything,” Michael pleads.

 

“Scout’s honor,” Jim says solemnly.

 

Michael leaves in a huff and Jim immediately turns on Karen.

 

“Do you see what happens when you question my instinct?” he accuses.

 

“Never again,” Karen says, wide-eyed. She holds up her hands in mock surrender. “I should never have doubted you.”

 

They grab their coats and slip out of the party unnoticed.

 

They spend the first fifteen minutes of the drive discussing the possibility of anonymously requesting health coverage for necrophilia. Then they try to figure out where they can find literature on necrophilia to give Michael, who could in turn pass it on to Jan to help educate her on her illness. They decide to check wikipedia for links, neither wanting to know what sites might pop up if they just google “necrophilia.”

 

It’s at about this time that Jim realizes he’s running low on gas. They pull off at a little two-pump place and Jim gets out of the car.

 

He’s making goofy faces at her through the window when his phone rings. Karen is about to open the door and hand him the phone when she sees the name lit up on the caller ID.

 

Pam.

 

She glances quickly at Jim and sees that he’s turned his attention to trying to stop the pump at exactly twenty five dollars. It’s a little game they play. She is always able to stop it on the exact dollar amount. He usually goes one or two cents over. The loser has to listen to the winner gloat for the entire car ride home. She’s gotten very good at gloating.

 

She slips his phone into her hands and cups her palm over the speaker, muffling the sound.

 

She hates herself so much right now, but she can’t help it. Why ruin a perfectly good night? Why end on a sour note that will keep her up at night thinking about sombreros and seamless cell phone pass-offs and long late-night talks?

 

So she turns his phone off. He can listen to the voicemail tomorrow.

 

Sometimes you just need to swat the mosquito.

 

It’s nothing personal, Karen tells herself. She likes Pam. Pam is a great person. She’s fun. And funny. And nice.

 

She just also happens to be the woman who her boyfriend had “just a crush” on and shared “just a kiss" with. Only he never manages to make “just” sound convincing, and he knows it.

 

She hates being jealous. She’s not a jealous person. It’s just hard to be completely invested in another person and feel like half the time their thoughts are centered on someone else. It makes her feel stupid, like she’s been used and discarded.

 

So when Jim reenters the car victorious over his ability to stop the pump at exactly twenty five bucks, Karen cheers him on, and doesn’t mention the phone call. And she doesn’t feel guilty. At least, not too guilty.

 

“Is everything okay?” he asks a few minutes later. “You’re quiet.”

 

“I’m fine,” she quickly replies. “But you look a little tired, actually.”

 

“Well, schmoozing is extremely hard work,” he says importantly.

 

“Oh really?” she asks. “Then maybe I should drive the rest of the way back. You really do look exhausted.”

 

“Think I’m too weak to make it home, huh? Are you questioning my manliness?” he asks her.

 

“Yes. That is exactly what I’m doing,” she responds.

 

She finds herself giggling again, and he assures her that he can drive the rest of the way home. It’s a good thing too, because she feels her eyes closing and the next time she opens them she sees signs welcoming them to Scranton.

 

“Your place or mine?” she hears him ask, and that really wakes her up. It sounds incredibly sexy coming from his lips. Fatigue has made his voice low and rough.

 

“Yours,” she answers.

 

“Do you need to grab anything from your place?”

 

“Nope. I have my toothbrush in my purse.”

 

“That was very presumptuous of you, Filipelli. One might get the impression that you’ve done this before,” he teases.

 

“Well, you know me. I come prepared. I’m no stranger to dipping my pen in company ink,” she replies as she sits up and stretches.

 

He makes a face.

 

“I’m pretty sure that saying only works for guys,” he says.

 

“I’m pretty sure you’re right,” she replies.

 

They smile a little, but then Karen can’t stop little chuckles from escaping her lips.

 

“What?” he asks.

 

“I can’t believe I fooled you so easily. Did you honestly think I slept with the CFO?”

 

“Well, I don’t know! We never really talked about all of our past relationships. It’s not like I know you that well,” he says.

 

He’s still smiling, but he sounds a little defensive, and Karen could swear she just saw a mosquito fluttering near the steering wheel. She knows that Pam never could have pulled off a prank like that. He knows Pam too well.

 

The silence is awkward and she’s happy when his house comes into view. The feeling is short-lived.

 

“Is that your mailbox in the middle of the road?” she asks warily.

 

He frowns and squints at the large object in the street.

 

“Yeah, I think so. Damn it. Some idiot coming back from a party with a few drinks in him probably plowed into it and kept going,” he mutters.

 

They get out of the car and she stands in the driveway while he drags his mailbox into the front yard, deciding he’ll wait until tomorrow to stand it back up.

 

They’re at the front door and just as he’s about to turn his key in the lock, a truck comes barreling into his driveway.

 

“Who’s that?” Karen asks uneasily.

 

But Jim isn’t answering. He’s just staring at the truck as two figures pile out.

 

“Hey, doesn’t he work in the warehouse?” Karen asks.

 

When he replies he sounds serious and anxious and it’s a combination that Karen has never heard from him before.

 

“You should go inside.”

At the sound of screeching tires, Jim spins around. His entire body tenses instantly when he sees a familiar pickup truck peel into his driveway. He has no idea what’s going on or why it’s happening tonight, but he knows it can’t be good.

 

He hears Karen ask, “Hey, doesn’t he work in the warehouse?” and he’s suddenly very aware that his girlfriend is standing next to him, and that can’t be good either. He turns to her and tries to muster as much urgency as he can.

 

“You should go inside,” he says, willing her to understand the seriousness of the situation. But she’s looking past him at the two figures piling out of the truck.

 

“But isn’t that Pam’s boyfriend?” she asks. She sounds a little anxious, but more confused than anything else.

 

Jim opens his mouth to tell her something, anything to get her attention back and direct her into the house, because it really can’t be good that Roy and the man with him are now lumbering away from the truck and toward him. But he doesn’t get any words out before Roy starts to shout.

 

“HALPERT!”

 

It sounds more like a roar, deep and animalistic. Jim doesn’t look at Roy. He pushes open the front door and turns back to Karen.

 

“Karen, get inside.” He doesn’t phrase it as a question.

 

“No! Just tell me what the hell is going on,” she pleads. She doesn’t look angry. She looks scared.

 

“I don’t know,” he says hastily, distracted by the fact that Roy has what appears to be a baseball bat in his hands.

 

“You came on t’her!” Roy hollers, his speech slurred. “You’re a dead man!”

 

The next thing Jim knows there is a loud smashing sound. Roy has swung the baseball bat in a terrific arch and landed its end right on Jim’s windshield. It doesn’t break completely, but splinters from top to bottom in expanding spider webs.

 

“What the hell, man!” Jim shouts. “What are you doing?!”

 

But Roy doesn’t seem to register anything that Jim said. He continues to march determinedly toward him. Jim tries to console himself with the fact that Roy has at least dropped the bat. It is very small consolation.

 

“Jim—” Karen starts to speak again, her voice at a higher register than Jim is used to hearing from her. He knows she’s going to ask more questions that he doesn’t have the answers to.

 

“Karen! I don’t know!” he says shortly. “Just—”

 

“Come in with me!” She tugs at his hand, but Jim is distracted by the fact that Roy is now mere feet away.

 

“I told you to look after her, you asshole!” Roy yells.

 

He takes two large steps towards Jim and pulls back a fist. Jim’s eyes widen and he ducks his head as quickly as he can. He can feel a gust of air brush his cheek and hair as Roy’s fist just misses. Panting rapidly, he holds up his hands and backs away.

 

“Whoa, whoa, whoa man! Back up! What are you talking about?” he says frantically, trying to put as much distance between himself and Roy as he can on the small stoop, while still keeping himself between Roy and Karen.

 

Roy missed by mere centimeters and the momentum of his swing has caused him to lose his balance. He clings to the railing on the front stoop for support.

 

“Oh, you don’t know? You just forgot the night that you came on to my fucking girlfriend?” he growls, shoving himself up from the railing.

 

Jim hears Karen say, “What?” behind him, but he is entirely focused on the fact the Roy is standing again.

 

“Okay, wait. You don’t know—” Jim begins.

 

“No! I do know! That’s the problem!” Roy roars.

 

Any further explanation on Jim’s part is cut off when Roy takes another powerful swing. It comes hard and fast, and this time it lands.

 

White hot pain explodes on the side of Jim’s face. He thinks that Roy must have shattered his cheekbone. He knows he heard a crack.

 

“Oh my God!” he hears Karen say in a panicked whisper. He feels her breath moving the hair by his ear.

 

He would have been on the ground if it hadn’t been for Karen standing behind him. He’s leaning completely against her, her arms around his waist. He has one hand up to shield himself from any new blows, and the other hand to his cheek, checking the damage. He feels wetness, and realizes that Roy split the skin on his cheek.

 

“I’m… Jesus… I’m fine,” Jim manages to stutter.

 

He presses against Karen and shakily gets to his feet. He’s wondering why Roy hasn’t hit him again yet, until he looks up and sees Roy is leaning heavily on the railing again. He’s clutching his right hand, and Jim realizes that the crack he heard must have been Roy’s hand breaking. He knows if he’s going to try to do anything to diffuse the situation he has to do it now.

 

“Roy, man, nothing happened,” Jim says. It hurts to speak. His entire face is throbbing but he keeps talking when Roy looks up at him. “She told me she chose you. I don’t know who told you—”

 

“Who do you think told me? Pam!” Roy snarls. His anger seems to motivate him enough to forget the pain in his hand, because he moves menacingly toward Jim again.

 

“You came on to Pam again?” Karen voice interjects. She has her hand on his arm and she’s searching his face. She looks wounded and not just a little angry.

 

“Wait, wait,” Jim says. He’s not sure who he’s addressing, Roy or Karen, but he needs a second to think. The side of his face is still pulsing with pain and sticky with blood, and chaos is pressing in from all sides.

 

“When was this?” Karen asks.

 

“Before!” Jim sputters. He feels like he can barely breathe. Too much is happening. “Before! God… This is just… This is…”

 

He can’t even form sentences. Roy is still looming but Jim’s attention is distracted by another loud crashing sound.

 

Jim cranes his neck around Roy to see that stranger with Roy has retrieved the mailbox from the middle of the front yard and is using it as a makeshift bat on the hood of Jim’s car. The hood has a deep V-bend in the center of it. Jim feels confusion and panic and anger bubble up and out of him.

 

“WHAT THE HELL?!” he shouts. “Who are you?!”

 

The man sways a little on his feet and whips the mailbox haphazardly across the yard before turning and pointing menacingly at Jim. A scream erupts from his lips.

 

“JET SKIS!”

 

He sways once more before collapsing into Jim’s car and promptly passing out.

 

Jim can’t figure out for the life of him what he has to do with jet skis, but then again nothing is making sense tonight. His entire head is one swirling vacuum of chaos.

 

“I’m gonna kill you, Halpert,” Roy growls again.

 

He roughly grabs Jim by the lapels of his jacket. Jim is ready this time, and braces himself against Roy, pushing his palms firmly against Roy’s chest and glaring back at him.

 

“Stop it! I’ll call the police!” Karen shouts warningly, but she pauses with one foot in the door and the other foot still on the stoop. She seems unable to tear herself away, and Jim can’t tell if it’s because she’s afraid that Roy will hit him again or if she doesn’t want to miss anything else that Roy might say.

 

“I trusted you, and you took my girlfriend,” Roy spits. He grits his teeth and moves his face so close to Jim that Jim can feel his breath hot against his injured cheek.

 

Jim feels the panic converting itself into rage. What right did Roy have to show up at his house and act like he was the victim in this situation? Like he was a model boyfriend and Jim had ruined his perfect future with Pam.

 

Jim fists the material of Roy’s shirt in his hands, squeezing hard. He isn’t going to apologize anymore.

 

“Fiancée,” Jim grits out.

 

Roy’s mouth tenses into a thin line and he pulls back a little.

 

“What?” he bites out.

 

“She was your fiancée, you fucking moron!” Jim snarls. “Not that you ever remembered it then either.”

 

“What?” Roy repeats dangerously. He gives Jim’s lapels and violent jerk, but Jim just clenches his fists tighter.

 

“When she left you, it wasn’t because of me,” Jim says in a low, heated voice. “It had nothing to do with me. You were a shitty fiancé. It was only a matter of time before she left your sorry ass.”

 

Jim is barely aware that Karen is speaking. He hears “She was engaged?” come from the general direction of the doorway, but Jim is entirely focused on Roy. He refuses to look away.

 

“Are you fucking kidding me, Halpert?!” Roy explodes. “You kissed her three weeks before our wedding day!”

 

And then he’s swinging wildly at Jim with his uninjured hand, but Jim is able to dodge the blow again. And this time when Roy’s momentum knocks him off balance, Jim gives him a brutal shove backwards, partly to stop Roy from coming at him again but mostly because he’s so worked up that he has to hit something and it might as well be Roy.

 

Roy seems dazed and unsure of what had just happened. It looks as though the pain in his hand, combined with his level of intoxication, have caught up with him all at once. His eyes flutter back in his skull and his eyelids slide slowly shut.

 

In the sudden silence Jim realizes that his breathing is deep and shaky. He squeezes his eyes shut for a second and takes a deep breath in. Then he tilts his head back and lets out a huge breath. He is vaguely aware that Karen is still standing half-in, half-out of the house, but he doesn’t look up at her.

 

“Jim.”

 

Her voice isn’t pleading or nervous anymore. It is impatient and irritated. It implies reproach and consequence.

 

She wants an explanation.

 

Jim feels frustration surge through him. He can’t deal with this right now.

 

“Karen,” he parrots in the same tone, mockingly.

 

“Don’t,” she hisses. “You never told me that she was engaged.”

 

Jim purses his lips and nods sharply.

 

“Face is fine, Karen. Thanks for asking,” he says.

 

“Fine,” she says angrily. “We can clean you up first, but we need to talk about—”

 

“I’m calling Pam,” he says brusquely, cutting her off.

 

Karen glares at him and shakes her head quickly, like he’s the one being unbelievable right now.

 

“Just call the police,” she says tersely.

 

But Jim isn’t listening anymore. He’s searching his pockets and trying to ignore the blood spattered on his shirt and tie.

 

“Where’s my damn cell phone?” he mutters.

 

He looks up at Karen and some unreadable emotion flashes quickly across her face. Realization, maybe. Or maybe guilt.

 

“You left it in the car,” she says. There is something wounded in her tone.

 

He knows that he should tell her that he’s just worked up, but he can’t muster the energy. It would be a lie. He’s irritated with her, and no discussion he enters into with her now can end well.

 

So he walks away and Karen stays on the stoop, half-in and half-out of the doorway.

 

***********

 

His phone is on the passenger seat, turned off. He must have powered it down without thinking because he can’t remember turning it off. When he powers it back up his phone alerts him that he has one missed call and one voicemail. He clears the alert messages. No time to worry about that right now.

 

He has to go into his contact list to find her number. He took her off his speed dial a week or so ago. The night of Phyllis’s wedding.

 

It rings just once and then he hears her voice.

 

“Are you okay?”

 

That throws him. How is that an acceptable way to answer the phone?

 

“What?” he asks dumbly.

 

“Are you okay?” she repeats.

 

And it hits him. She knew. She knew that Roy was coming. Nice.

 

“Aside from the gash on the side of my face, yeah,” he says bitterly.

 

“Oh my God. He came after you?” she asks.

 

“Who, Roy? Oh, yeah. He stopped by,” Jim says angrily.

 

“I’m so sorry. Are you—”

 

Jim cuts her off. No amount of pleading can make this okay.

 

“You know, you might have given me a little warning!”

 

There is a pause. When Pam speaks again she sounds hesitant and anxious.

 

“Didn’t you get my voicemail?”

 

Jim feels the wind leave his sails.

 

“Oh,” was all he said, because he couldn’t bring himself to apologize.

 

“I would have left a message on your home machine, but I don’t know your home number anymore.”

 

Another awkward pause overtakes them. Her statement strikes Jim as so incredibly depressing. He hadn’t moved back in with Mark and he never bothered to tell Pam his new number. Why would he? They weren’t… whatever they were before, they weren’t that anymore.

 

“It wouldn’t have done any good,” Jim began, trying to brush off those thoughts. “He came just as Karen and I were about to go inside.”

 

Pam takes a second to reply, and Jim wonders if she is processing the fact that Karen is with him.

 

“Is he still there?” she asks.

 

“Passed out in the front yard. Along with some other guy.”

 

“Kenny?”

 

“Well, we didn’t really exchange pleasantries, so I’m not sure on his name,” Jim retorts.

 

“Big guy, grayish hair?” Pam asks, ignoring his tone.

 

“Hard to tell. I was a little distracted when he tried to destroy my car with my mailbox and then started screaming about jet skis,” Jim responds irritably.

 

“Yup. That’s Kenny. Where do you live? I’ll take them home.”

 

Jim hesitates. He really doesn’t want to see her right now. He doesn’t want to think of the turmoil it will cause, not just with Roy, but with Karen as well. He relents in the end mainly because of his desire to get this entire night over with. Calling the cops would entail hours of waiting and giving statements and rehashing everything. Besides, he’s her boyfriend and if she wants to cart his drunk ass around tonight, that’s her prerogative.

 

“324 Brooke,” he says abruptly.

 

“Oh,” she says softly.

 

“What?”

 

“Nothing.” She pauses. “It’s just… You’re only like five minutes from my apartment.”

 

“Oh,” Jim finds himself repeating.

 

It feels strange to him to know that she was that close this whole time. It felt farther.

 

“I’m in starting up my car now,” Pam says. He can hear what sounds like the startup of an engine.

 

He knows that it’s time to hang up, but he can’t let this go. Not just yet. He needs to know some things, things that he won’t be able to ask once Pam arrives and Karen is listening to them.

 

“Why did you tell him?” he asks.

 

“Excuse me?” She sounds surprised.

 

“Why now? Why did you tell him now?”

 

She sighs into the phone.

 

“I… I just wanted to be honest,” she says finally. “I knew we didn’t have a chance if I wasn’t completely honest.”

 

Jim feels his heart skip a beat.

 

“We?” he asks.

 

“Me and Roy,” Pam clarifies without hesitation, like she didn’t even know what he was thinking.

 

Fantastic. He could have kicked himself for letting his heart jump like that. What is wrong with him? His girlfriend is standing twenty feet away. And he’s mad at Pam. Very mad, he tells himself.

 

“So, I’m guessing that went pretty well? Telling him?” Jim says sarcastically.

 

When Pam doesn’t answer, Jim frowns. It didn’t occur to him just how badly things might have gone until the question left his mouth. He feels panic surging in his chest.

 

“Pam, what happened?” he prods.

 

“I talk about it in the voicemail,” she says evasively.

 

“Just tell me,” he demands.

 

She sighs again. It takes a couple of seconds for her to reply, but for Jim it feels like hours. Every second that passes gives his mind time to create terrifying scenarios.

 

“Um, we were at Poor Richard’s when I told him. He just sort of… lost it,” she says quietly. “No, not sort of. He lost it,” she continues, more decisively.

 

Jim is about to interject and ask what the hell that means when she continues.

 

“I heard a lot of glass breaking when I left. I didn’t stick around to see how much damage he did. It was… scary.”

 

At her last word, Jim makes up his mind.

 

“I don’t want you coming here,” he says.

 

“What?”

 

“I don’t want him near you,” he replies. His tone is strong and resolute.

 

“He didn’t touch me,” she says defensively, although he didn’t ask.

 

“You didn’t see him a second ago, Pam,” Jim protests. “He’s really drunk and really angry.”

 

“I’ve seen him worse,” Pam says simply. “A lot worse.”

 

“Well that’s… fantastic.”

 

“He’s never hit me,” she says.

 

“What has he done?”

 

He thinks of the way Roy sometimes grabbed her arm and pulled her from the room when they fought at work. He wonders how far that treatment extended. How far has he gone without actually hitting her? Had there been nights when he came home drunk and yelling nonsensically and he found her a suitable target for his frustrations?

 

Horrible images of Roy pressing her against the door, or against the wall, or against a bed flash successively through his thoughts as he waits for her to respond.

 

“I’m like two minutes away,” is all she says.

 

He doesn’t want to know what her non-answer means. All he knows is that she is not coming here.

 

“So turn around and go back,” he says. “I’ll have the police take care of it.”

 

“No!” she replies firmly. “Jim, look… I know what he did was completely inexcusable, but it’s my fault too. I told him in public, I didn’t think he would be so mad. I don’t know why I thought that, I mean… I cheated on him.”

 

“Don’t,” Jim says dangerously. “Don’t do that. Don’t make excuses for him.”

 

“I’m not—that’s not what I’m doing. Just… Look, I’m just going to drop him off at his place. It’s over between us. We’re… it’s over.”

 

He doesn’t even let himself feel that swelling in his chest this time.

 

“Oh yeah? For how long this time?” he asks venomously.

 

“Excuse me?” She sounds as angry as he does.

 

“You heard me. Last time it was eight months. How long this time? Two? Three?” he continues. He can’t stop himself.

 

“I’m a block away,” she says tersely. “I’ll pick Roy and Kenny up and you can get back to your girlfriend.”

 

She emphasizes her last word. The message is clear. Jim tries to tell himself that his concern has nothing to do with the any feelings he may or may not have for her. That he knows Roy is an asshole and that is where his concern is rooted. But he knows that isn’t true.

 

“Pam, look—” he starts.

 

“No,” she snaps. “This conversation is over.”

 

He hears a click, and he squeezes his eyes shut, willing this whole night to just end already. He remains that way until he hears an approaching car. He sees Pam’s little car pulling into his driveway. And then he hears shouting and he realizes that Roy was awake again.

 

***********

 

Karen stands frozen, watching Jim root through his car for his phone. She realizes that she is still standing in the middle of the doorway like an idiot.

 

Such an idiot, she thinks.

 

An idiot to move all the way out here for a guy she barely knew, an idiot to stay with him just because she was willing to believe the lies that she pushed him into telling her over the course of five long nights, an idiot for thinking that they could share one night together, just the two of them, without her invading his thoughts.

 

Such an idiot.

 

She tries to make sense of the night in her head. Jim had told her that they kissed. She shouldn’t be upset about that. What he neglected to mention was the little fact that, oh yeah, she was engaged at the time. Three weeks before their wedding day? Jesus, it sounded like something out of a movie. Something out of a stupid chick flick where the guy saves the girl from marrying some oaf at the last minute and then the audience cheers and cries and leaves the theater feeling like they could find someone like that one day.

 

Karen hates chick flicks.

 

The thing that keeps coming back to her, haunting her, is the fact that Pam apparently didn’t marry Roy. And what does that mean? Why did the wedding never happen?

 

But she stops herself from thinking that, because that road leads to madness. She can explain this away, because hey, even though Pam didn’t marry Roy, she didn’t get together with Jim either. Right? So… Jim was probably right when he told Roy that Pam’s breaking the wedding off had nothing to do with him.

 

Yeah. Nothing.

 

And when Jim got angry and defensive it wasn’t about Pam at all. It was about the fact that this guy was destroying his car and throwing punches. Anyone would have been mad. And the fact that he’s currently leaning against his car with his back to her, talking to her… That doesn’t mean anything either.

 

“I’m gonna fucking kill him.”

 

Karen rolls her eyes and looks down at the collapsed man at her feet. He was awake again. Awesome.

 

“Take it easy,” she mutters.

 

“Fuck. Three weeks before our wedding…”

 

He continues to grumble. She occasionally hears words like “kill” and “whore” and “trusted” and she finds that he’s really getting on her nerves.

 

“Look, she was drunk when she did it,” she says edgily. Anything to get him to shut up.

 

“No she wasn’t,” he slurs.

 

She rolls her eyes again.

 

“Jim said you left early,” she starts, but Roy cuts her off.

 

“Yeah?” he sneers. “What else did Halpert say?”

 

Karen grits her teeth but continues.

 

“You left, she started drinking. A lot. So just… I don’t know. It should make you feel a little better. She probably didn’t even mean it.”

 

She feels a sinking feeling and finishes her sentence in her mind.

 

But he did.

 

He was sober. He meant every word. If anyone should be feeling like crap, it shouldn’t be Roy, she thinks bitterly.

 

“She said she had feelings for him,” Roy moans, rubbing his hands wearily over his face.

 

And the sinking feeling becomes a plummeting sensation.

 

“What?” she asks immediately.

 

But Roy is in his own head, and he’s moved on to feeling sorry for himself again.

 

“Jesus. She fucking cheated on me,” he mutters.

 

Karen barely hears him, because her stomach is doing somersaults. It just doesn’t make any sense. If she actually had feelings for him, then why didn’t they get together when she left Roy? What is missing from this picture?

 

And did Pam actually say “had”? Did she say she had feelings or that she has them? Because that one letter makes a world of difference. The memory of Pam’s response to the question, “Wait, you’re not still… interested in him?” flashes through her mind.

 

Oh, yeah.

She had said it with total certainty. Did she really just get confused by Karen’s phrasing?

 

Roy’s voice breaks through her thoughts again.

 

“I can’t… I can’t believe it. Fucking Casino night.”

 

“What?” Karen asks. What is he talking about now?

 

“They probably didn’t even wait for me to leave the parking lot. Just went at it right outside the warehouse,” he says. He’s talking to himself, not responding to Karen.

 

Karen squints at him. How drunk is he?

 

“It was a Chili’s,” she reminds him.

 

Finally he looks at her. His eyes are bloodshot and his mouth is hanging open and he’s squinting at her now.

 

“What?” he asks.

 

“They kissed in a Chili’s,” Karen repeats slowly. She’s getting really sick of him. It occurs to her that she should just go inside or, even better, go home to her own house, but she can’t bring herself to leave.

 

“He took her to a restaurant? Like they were on a fucking date?” Roy asks incredulously. Then his voice gets low and dangerous again. “Oh, I’m gonna kill him.”

 

Karen resists the urge to roll her eyes a third time.

 

“You’re drunk,” she says impatiently. “They were already at the Chili’s. You weren’t at the warehouse.”

 

“No. The casino was in the warehouse,” Roy maintains. He doesn’t sound as drunk as he did a few minutes ago, and Karen finds herself thinking that maybe he’s not the confused one.

 

“What casino? You gamble at the Dundies?” she asks, giving him the benefit of the doubt.

 

“Dundies? What?” he asks. He’s struggling to sit up now.

 

“Okay, Roy, you know what? You just need to close your eyes and—”

 

“WHAT?” Roy shouts. He’s almost on his feet and he looks positively murderous. “They kissed at the Dundies?”

 

“…Yeah,” Karen says hesitantly. What was going on? “Pam told you—”

 

“Pam told me they kissed on Casino night!” Roy hollers. He’s standing fully now.

 

“I… what? What’s Casino Night?” Karen asks helplessly. Nothing is making any sense.

 

“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me!” Roy mutters to himself. Then he spins around and roars, “HALPERT!”

 

Karen looks past Jim’s confused expression to see Pam’s small car pulling into the driveway.

 

She is curled up on the couch with a mug of Earl Gray when she hears his call come through.

 

About a year ago (has it really been a year?) he had insisted that she give him his own ring tone so that she would instantly know it was him calling. She had teased him, accusing him of being awfully full of himself to think that he was important enough to get his own ring. In retaliation, she gave him the most obnoxious ring tone that her phone offered: a cheesy polyphonic version of “When the Saints Go Marching In.”

 

Unfazed, he proceeded to call her every fifteen minutes that day, performing a little satisfied head bob to the tune while she battled her embarrassment under the annoyed glares of Stanley and Angela. But she refused to change his ring, because she wouldn’t admit defeat.

But when all of a sudden “When the Saints Go Marching In” comes blaring from her phone, she is completely startled and bewildered. She forgot about his special ring. He hasn’t called her cell—not once—since that night, the night that she just told Roy about.

 

She still manages to answer before the song reaches its second verse, and she finds herself running to her car while they speak.

 

So now she’s in her car, and she’s trying not to think about the different activities that Jim and Karen could have been engaged in that would have distracted him from checking his voicemail.

 

She’s only a few minutes from his house when his tone changes from angry to protective. She can practically see his body stiffen and his jaw clench right before he says, “I don’t want him near you.”

 

She immediately feels her defenses go up. Because why should he get to care now? Why does he get to act like he cares about what happens between her and Roy?

 

So she rushes to end his concern, to push him away. She tells him that Roy has never hit her, even though he doesn’t ask.

 

And when he asks her “What has he done?” in that skeptical tone, she hates him.

 

Because she remembers brutal fingers encircling her arms and squeezing till it hurt. She remembers his large frame towering over her and her scrambling backward until her back hit the wall. She remembers being awakened to the weight of his body pressing down on hers, clumsy hands pawing at her nightshirt, and the smell of alcohol on his breath.

 

And she doesn’t hate Roy when these memories invade her mind. She hates Jim. Because he’s forcing her to realize again how stupid she was for staying with Roy when she had the chance to leave him for something—someone better. How weak she was to ever go back to him just because she was lonely and he managed to make her smile. How she made a complete mess of everything yet again.

 

But what really gets her is when he asks, “Last time it was eight months. How long this time?”

 

Because fuck him. Because what did he know about anything? Because how could he trivialize everything it had taken for her to leave Roy? Because when did he ever have to force himself to admit that the last ten years of his life were a waste?

 

Because why does he get to act like he cares now when he didn’t do anything during those eight months to make her think that she shouldn’t go back to Roy? Has he conveniently forgotten that?

 

She jogs his memory by acidly saying that she’ll be there soon so that he can get back to his girlfriend.

 

He tries to say something else, but she hangs up and clenches the steering wheel to stop her hands from shaking.

 

When she pulls up to his house the first thing she sees is Jim standing in the middle of the driveway. She only sees his profile, because he’s looking at something by his front door, but before she can turn to see what he’s looking at she notices his cheek.

 

“Oh my god,” she mutters.

 

She knows that faces bleed a lot. She’s gotten errant cuts on her cheek or chin before in little accidents. But this is a lot of blood. It’s all over his cheek and some of it is spattered on his shirt. It’s darker, almost purple right above his cheekbone.

 

Her stomach turns and all of the anger she felt is pushed out of the way by panic and concern and guilt. She’s frowning when she undoes her seatbelt and pushes her way out of the car. He turns to look at her as she takes a few hurried steps toward him, but her progress is halted by the sound of Roy shouting.

 

“HALPERT!”

 

She sees Roy on the doorstep with Karen. His face is redder than Jim’s, although he isn’t bleeding. She shoots an alarmed look at Jim.

 

“I thought you said he passed out,” she says to him. She immediately berates herself.

 

Nice, Pam. He’s standing in front of you, bleeding, and the first words out of your mouth are “I thought you said he passed out?” Try, “Oh my God, your face! Are you okay?” Try, “I’m so sorry.” Idiot.

 

“He did,” Jim says. He sounds annoyed, and she can’t blame him.

 

Roy is still shouting belligerently. Karen is looking on from a foot or two away. She doesn’t seem at all fazed by the screaming man next to her. She doesn’t look scared or worried. She looks blank, like she’s in a daze.

 

“Karen! Get away from him!” Jim shouts.

 

Karen looks up, as if noticing Jim for the first time. She makes no move toward the door.

 

“Is that Pam?” Roy bellows. “Pam, you came just in time to watch me beat the crap out of your boyfriend!”

 

But when Roy his first furious step toward the two of them, Karen suddenly snaps out of whatever thoughts have been consuming her. She grasps wildly at Roy’s arm, tugging just hard enough to send him tottering a few inches backwards. He flails violently, trying to shove Karen off of him. Jim takes a step forward, poised and ready to intervene, but he stops when Roy successfully frees himself without hurting Karen.

 

However, Roy’s exertions have thrown him off balance and he lurches face first toward the ground. He reacts instantaneously, sticking both hands out in front of him to break his fall.

 

As soon as his hands hit the pavement, he screams. He lets loose a string of profanity, interspersed with howls of pain.

 

Pam whirls around to face Jim.

 

“What’s wrong with him?” she asks desperately.

 

It doesn’t make sense for him to be in that much pain from such a short fall. She can’t help the tug of pity in her gut. She doesn’t want to cause Roy any more pain tonight. She knows that Jim can see it in her face, and his expression hardens.

 

“He broke his hand on my face. Poor guy,” Jim deadpans.

 

Pam let’s out a little, “Oh,” and gives Jim a contrite look. She wants to say something about his face, about how sorry she is, but then Roy howls again and she turns away. She rushes over to Roy and she can hear Jim following behind her.

 

He looks terrible. She leans down over his collapsed form to catch a glimpse of his injured hand. If it was broken to begin with, then landing with all of his weight on it a second ago can’t be good. The skin is mottled and bruised. There is a strange lump below one of his knuckles, and Pam cringes when she realizes that it’s probably a bone protruding out of place. She’s thankful that the bone didn’t break through skin, because then she might have actually fainted.

 

“Roy, come on. We have to go to the hospital,” she says gently.

 

She reaches for him, but he draws back sharply.

 

“I’m not going anywhere with you, you… you slut!”

 

She sees Jim stiffen beside her and she reels back, wounded. She wants to explain it away as a drunken insult that he doesn’t really mean, but she can’t. She tries to tell herself that it wasn’t cheating. That it was just a kiss. But she knows in her heart that’s not true either. So she decides to ignore the insult altogether.

 

“Look, let’s just call for an ambulance,” Jim says quietly so that only she can hear. “You aren’t getting in a car with him.”

 

“No!” she blurts out. She is going to fix this. “Jim just—look, if you want to help me you can start moving Kenny toward my car.”

 

Jim looks at her, disbelief evident on his face. He raises his eyebrows and juts out his chin a little.

 

“Um, he’s huge and he’s dead weight so I’m thinking that’s not going to happen. He’ll be spending a comfortable night on the hood of my car.”

 

Pam feels her agitation rising, but Roy’s voice distracts her again.

 

“How many other times were there?” he growls.

 

She can’t figure out what he’s referring to, but she really doesn’t want to have a conversation with him. She wants to get him out of here and into a hospital and just be done with this night. With this relationship.

 

“Roy, your hand. Come on. I’m trying to help you here,” she says.

 

“NO! Pam! You don’t want to help me! You lied to me!” Roy shouts.

 

Pam frowns again. He doesn’t seem too drunk. She’s seen him much worse, but he isn’t making any sense.

 

“No, I told you the truth,” she says. For once, she adds to herself.

 

“Then it was a lie of the mission!” he blusters.

 

“What?” she asks, more confused than ever.

 

“I think he means lie of omission,” Jim interjects in a mocking tone.

 

“Stay out of this, you stupid fuck!” Roy bellows.

 

Jim purses his lips and nods.

 

“Yeah? What are you gonna do? Fall down at me?” he retorts.

 

“Maybe I’ll just even out your face, huh? Hit your other cheek so you have a matching pair?” Roy snarls.

 

“Cool,” Jim says, mock-casually. His eyes light up like a great idea just occurred to him. “Hey, maybe you could break your other hand doing it and look even smarter.”

 

Pam has had enough of this.

 

“Stop it!” she shouts, glaring at Jim. He stares back at her defiantly. She is about to say more to him, but Roy is talking to her again.

 

“You said it was one kiss,” Roy says. It sounds like an accusation.

 

“Roy, I have no idea what you’re talking about. Just please come with me,” Pam says impatiently.

 

“The DUNDIES Pam?!” Roy bellows. “That was like eight months before Casino Night!”

 

And Pam is suddenly frozen where she stands. Her stomach drops to her feet. How the hell did this happen? She whips around to face Jim, because he must have said something before she got there. Would he really be stupid enough to egg Roy on like that?

 

But Jim isn’t looking back at Pam. He’s staring straight ahead at Karen, who has just been standing there, silent and forgotten in the chaos

 

“What the hell, Karen?” he asks, disbelievingly.

 

Karen’s expression changes from blank to furious in no time flat.

 

“Don’t you dare get mad at me,” she hisses. “How the hell was I supposed to know? It’s not my fault that the two of you each told us about one kiss and they weren’t the same one!”

 

“What?” Pam says, bewildered. She still can’t quite fit everything together in her head.

 

“Don’t ‘what’ me, damn it!” Roy hollers. He starts to struggle to his feet. “I know about the Dundies, Pam! I know that you and Halpert were sucking face as soon as I left.”

 

And then it clicks.

 

Pam reels around to face Jim.

 

“That’s the kiss you told her about?” she asks him incredulously.

 

“What?” Karen blurts out. “Jesus, how many were there to choose from?”

 

Pam shakes her head dismissively.

 

“Look, it doesn’t matter,” she says shortly. “Roy, that kiss… I was drunk. I barely even remember it.”

 

LIAR! The voice in Pam’s head screams. She remembers that kiss. She remembers every detail. She has called that particular memory up countless times since that night.

 

“Doesn’t matter?” Roy repeats furiously. “Why are you avoiding the question, Pam? How many were there?”

 

“Did it stop at kissing?” Karen interjects, looking at Jim.

 

Pam feels something in her snap. She doesn’t enjoy being double-teamed all of a sudden and she’s getting fed up.

 

“You know, it’s not like you exactly gave me a chance to come clean on everything, Roy. You pretty much ended the conversation when you started throwing things,” she snaps.

 

“Come clean on everything?! What is everything?” Karen demands.

 

“Nothing!” Jim says impatiently. “There were just two kisses!”

 

“Oh, I’m just supposed to believe that?” Karen retorts. “I wasn’t throwing things, Jim. You had the chance to tell me everything.”

 

“Jesus, Karen. Not. Now,” Jim bites out. He shoots Karen a warning look.

 

“Roy, it didn’t mean anything. Just calm down,” Pam says. It’s another lie, of course, but she needs to stop him from getting worked up again.

 

“Oh, right. Of course,” Roy says bitterly. “It was just a kiss. It had nothing to do with you calling off the wedding. That’s what Halpert was saying before. But we both know better don’t we, Pam?”

 

He sneers at her and she feels the last of her patience evaporate.

 

“Roy, just get in the car!” she shouts.

 

“No! You think you have the right to tell me what to do? You’re a fucking whore!”

 

This time it’s easier to brush the insult aside.

 

“You’re drunk,” she declares with irritation.

 

“Doesn’t mean you’re not a whore,” he retorts viciously.

 

Pam freezes again. She grits her teeth and purses her lips.

 

“Nice,” she mutters. “Roy, just—”

 

“No, no, no, Pam. You ‘just’! Okay?”

 

“What? What does that even mean?” she asks in annoyance.

 

Roy opens and closes his mouth a couple of times, trying to come up with a reply. In the end, he settles for another insult.

 

“You just think you’re so much better than me, huh?” he snarls.

 

“Roy—” Pam begins.

 

“No!” he shouts. “You think you can just pretend that you’re little Miss Perfect? Perfect Pammy, here to save the day, huh?”

 

“Oh yeah, that’s exactly what I think,” she says, rolling her eyes. Not this rant again.

 

“Yeah. It is,” he snaps back. “Well, guess what, Pam? I never cheated! Okay? That was you. You’re the reason that this didn’t work.”

 

Pam nods stiffly.

 

“Okay, Roy. You’re right. It’s all me. So you don’t have to be mad at Jim or anyone else. So let’s just go to the hospital.”

 

“Don’t do that,” Roy says sharply. “Don’t talk to me like I’m a little kid. I hate it when you do that.”

 

“What do you want me to do, Roy?” Pam says in exasperation. “Because you can’t stay here and keep acting like a lunatic.”

 

“What do I want?” Roy repeats. “I want you to tell little Jimmy Halpert here exactly what you told me, because he seems a little confused. He seems to think that it was just a kiss—oh, wait, I’m sorry—kisses,” Roy sneers.

 

And then he says something that makes her feel like she has just been punched in the stomach, like all of the air has been forced from her lungs and she’s paralyzed.

 

“Why don’t you tell him what you told me, huh? I want him to know what a whore you are. Tell him that you had feelings for him while we were together.”

When he calls her a whore, Jim almost loses it. 

 

He wants to brush past Pam and just barrel into Roy, no plan on how to hurt him or what to aim for.  He just wants to throw himself at the idiot and use whatever seems right at the moment—fists, elbows, knees—to cause him as much pain as possible. 

 

Pam has a clearer head than him.  She doesn’t even acknowledge the insult.  She tells Roy he’s just drunk.  But when Roy responds with, “Doesn’t mean you’re not a whore,” Jim starts strategizing.

 

He thinks he’d aim for the mouth first, because that’s the body part that’s causing Pam pain, but targeting Roy’s hand is sure to inflict the most pain on Roy, so it’s really a toss up at the moment.

 

But he doesn’t lunge at Roy, because the conversation has moved on and Roy is now proving just how stupid he really is.  He’s spewing desperate insults at Pam, each one worse than the last.

 

Jim glances up and sees Karen, still on the stoop, scowling at him.  He defiantly meets her gaze and holds it.  He knows that it’s his fault for only telling Karen about the one kiss, but he’s finding it hard to feel contrite when Karen is just dumping more fuel on the fire at every turn.  Yes, he has some explaining to do, but is it so hard to understand that maybe now isn’t the best time?

 

Jim hears his own name and breaks eye contact with Karen.

 

“I want you to tell little Jimmy Halpert here exactly what you told me, because he seems a little confused.  He seems to think that it was just a kiss—oh, wait, I’m sorry—kisses,” Roy sneers at Pam.

 

Jim finds himself frowning and looking questioningly at Pam.  He knows that he shouldn’t go along with Roy here.  He should interject and say that Pam doesn’t have to tell him anything, but curiosity stills his tongue.  And then Roy continues.

 

“Why don’t you tell him what you told me, huh?  I want him to know what a whore you are.  Tell him that you had feelings for him while we were together.”

 

And the earth stops spinning.

 

Jim is positive that must be what just happened, because he feels an actual jolt, like the ground just jerked to a sudden halt beneath his feet, and he actually pitches forward an inch or two before he regains his balance.  In what feels like slow motion, he turns his face away from Roy and toward her, but she’s looking straight ahead.

 

He knows that she must be able to see him in her periphery, staring at her, but her eyes remain steadfastly locked on Roy.  She looks paralyzed.  A stunned expression is frozen on her face.  She doesn’t even seem to be breathing.  Jim isn’t entirely convinced that she hasn’t been replaced with an incredibly life-like plastic replica when he wasn’t looking.

 

He can’t figure out if she looks surprised because it’s true and she didn’t think that Roy would tell him, or if she looks surprised because it isn’t true and Roy is just messing with all of them. 

 

But if it is true, then why wouldn’t she have told him in the first place?  Why does he have to find out from Roy, of all people? 

 

And when Roy said that she “had” feelings for him, did that mean that it was over?  Or did Roy get it wrong, and did she actually say that she “has” feelings for him?  Or did she say “had” but really mean “has”? 

 

And if it is true, and she did mean “has,” then what does that mean for him?  What would he do with that information?  He thinks vaguely of Karen, but can’t bring himself to look up at her.

 

He can’t figure out how long it’s been since someone spoke.  His head has been so full of relentless waves of questions, and questions about questions, that he’s lost all sense of time.  It feels like several minutes, but he knows it can’t have been more than ten seconds.

 

And then Pam’s expression unfreezes abruptly, like she’s just been jerked awake.  She frowns and narrows her eyes at Roy, and Jim can’t tell whether that’s good or bad.  She parts her lips and inhales a little and Jim holds his breath.

 

“If you won’t let me take you to the hospital, then I’m going to have to call an ambulance,” she says calmly, carefully pronouncing each word.  She sounds perfectly composed, as if Roy didn’t just say something life-altering.

 

Jim feels like he’s been pricked by a needle and all of the air is slowly deflating from his body.  He looks away sharply.  It’s a hasty motion, full of agitation and disappointment.  He can’t look at her. 

 

She did it again. 

 

She responded to a desperate situation, something full of significance and possibility, with a non sequitur, a non-answer.

 

It’s like saying, “I’m like two minutes away” when someone asks you how close your boyfriend has come to hitting you, or saying “I can’t” when someone tells you they’re in love with you.  Responses that don’t address the issue.  Responses that change the subject and shut down the possibility for further discussion. 

 

And Jim realizes that all of the questions invading his mind are pointless.  Because it doesn’t really matter whether or not Pam said that she had feelings for him, and it doesn’t matter if she meant “had” or “has.”  None of it matters at all if Pam refuses to acknowledge it. 

 

The realization makes Jim feel grim and exasperated and hopeless.

 

“You asked me what I wanted, and I told you.  Don’t change the subject,” Roy says coldly.

 

It’s the first time in… well, ever, that Jim has been one hundred percent in agreement with Roy.  He knows it’s twisted for him to be on Roy’s side tonight, but he’s not thinking clearly and he just wants something from Pam.  Something real.  Something honest.

                                                                                                         

But Pam ignores Roy and continues her relentless pursuit of logic.

 

“If an ambulance arrives and you’re still acting like this, then they’re gonna have to call the cops, and I know that you and Kenny can’t post bail.”

 

She has her hands on her hips, and she’s looking at him sternly, like she’s completely forgotten what Roy just said.  Like it didn’t even register on her radar, while Jim doesn’t think that he can ever forget it.

 

“I’m not going anywhere with you,” Roy growls.

 

“Well, you can’t drive with your hand like that.  Not to mention the fact that you’re drunk.  You can’t afford to get another DUI.”

 

Her logical tone is driving Jim insane.  How can she be so unaffected?  How can she plow ahead and not betray any hint of a reaction to Roy’s accusation?  Apparently it’s getting to Roy too.

 

“Stop changing the subject!” Roy shouts.

 

“If you—” she starts.

 

“No!  I want you to deny it, Pam!” Roy interrupts.  “Turn to Halpert right now and tell him that you didn’t have feelings for him when we were together.”

 

“Just drop it, Roy!” Pam snaps. 

 

Jim feels a flash of satisfaction at just seeing Pam give a reaction, finally.  But he’s still afraid that this will all get swept under the carpet.  He can’t let her get away with non-answers anymore.  He’s so sick of the miscommunication and the uncertainty.

 

“Pam.  What’s he talking about?” Jim says, trying to sound as gentle and casual as possible.

 

She whirls on him, eyes wild and angry.

 

“No!” she hisses.  “No, I am not doing this right now!”

 

And just like that Jim is tired of being gentle and casual about this.  He’s waited long enough.

 

“Then when?” he demands, abandoning all pretense of composure.

 

“Just—don’t encourage him!  I don’t need this right now!” Pam berates Jim.  Her voice is harsh, but soft enough that only he hears.

 

Jim knows that he should stop.  After all, isn’t what Pam is saying to him exactly what he’s been telling Karen?  She’s already getting grief from Roy and she doesn’t need it from him too.  But his mouth is open again before he can stop himself.

 

“Why can’t you just answer the question?” he demands.

 

She just stares at him for a second.  Then her lips are pursed and her eyebrows draw together, and he’s certain that he’s never seen her this angry at him before. 

 

“Of course.  Because you always need an answer right away, don’t you Jim?” she says.  Her question comes out curt and heated, and it’s clear that it’s not a question so much as an accusation.

 

Jim has no idea what she’s suggesting.  Hasn’t he been the one doing all the waiting?  Since the day he met her he’s been waiting.

 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asks, and he wants to kick himself because he sounds like a petulant teenager.

 

“Oh come on,” she says irritably.  “You just spit out life-changing announcements and if you don’t get the answer you want within thirty seconds you’re gone.  Isn’t that the way it works?”

 

Jim is stunned.  He wants to defend himself, but he doesn’t know how to respond.  So he doesn’t respond at all.  He stands there like an idiot, mouth opening and closing a few times as he searches for something, anything, to say.  But Roy fills the silence for him.

 

“I swear to God, Pam.  If you don’t tell him, I’m gonna tell the world!  I’m gonna tell everyone what a slut you are!” Roy bellows theatrically.  He sounds so melodramatic that it would be funny if the situation wasn’t so completely messed up.

 

Pam looks back at Roy like she can’t even recognize him.  She’s frowning and shaking her head in disgust.

 

“Okay.  I’m going to call 911,” she says, reaching into her pocket, presumably for her cell phone.

 

“No, you know what you can do for me, Pammy?  You can take your slutty little mouth and keep it shut,” Roy shouts venomously.

 

Jim feels anger surge through him.  His blood is pumping so quickly that it’s all he can hear.  He’s clenching his fists so hard that he’s sure that his knuckles must be white. 

 

He wants so badly just to hit Roy.  He’s itching to do it.  He’s angry at everyone.  At Pam and at Karen and at himself, but mainly he’s mad at Roy.  And Roy’s the one that he can actually hit, so Jim is considering this a win-win situation. 

 

He’s ready and he starts to move forward when Pam completely surprises him.

 

“Screw you, Roy,” she says aggressively.

 

Jim has never heard that voice come from her before.  She’s losing her cool.  The calm, collected Pam that arrived at his house to resolve this mess has been replaced by someone entirely new.  This Pam is flushed and edgy and dangerous. 

 

“Apparently not,” Roy retorts.  “Bet you screwed Halpert though, right?  I mean, if you lied about a kiss, what else did you lie about?”

 

Jim feels his stomach jump at the thought that Roy presents, the thought of he and Pam doing more than kissing.

 

“Stop it.  You can’t talk to me like this anymore.  Don’t call me a slut,” Pam says in the same warning tone.

 

“Why not?  It’s true,” Roy says cruelly.  He’s just taunting her now.

 

“You like to think that you’re such a victim, don’t you?” she explodes.  “You were never there for me!  I was getting nothing from you!  Jim was—”

 

“Jim was what?” Roy interjects.  He doesn’t shout, but his voice is deadly.

 

Jim can’t help the thrill that floods his body at the mention of his name.  He ignores the fact that Roy’s is once again staring daggers at him, and waits with bated breath for Pam’s response.

 

“He was the only person in my life who I could talk to besides my mom.  Okay?  He was my best friend.  He knew me.”

 

And just like that, the rush of excitement is gone. 

 

Past tense. 

 

She was talking about him in the past tense.  And she wasn’t looking at him.  It was like the person she was talking about wasn’t him at all.  Like he was some stranger that just happened to be overhearing her argument.

 

And all Jim can think is, she must have said “had.”

 

“Knew you?  Is that some kind of code for sex?” Roy asks.  “You really are a slut.”

 

“Shut up!” Pam yells. 

 

The situation is escalating out of control.  Jim regrets any feelings of triumph that came over him when Pam first lost her cool, because it’s gone too far.  Roy is getting her worked up to the point that she’s starting to crack.

 

“Did you love him, Pam?  What were the feelings that you had?” Roy asks in a mocking tone.  “Was it love?  Or did you just want a fuck buddy?” he continues mercilessly.

 

“Stop it,” Jim hears himself say.  His voice is rigid and resolute, but neither Roy nor Pam seems to hear him.

 

“I am not talking to you about this,” Pam says.  She’s shaking. Her eyes are glassy and wide.

 

But Roy shows no sign of letting up.

 

“Did you love him?!” he hollers.

 

“Just stop!” Pam shouts.  A few tears have escaped the corners of her eyes and begun the slow descent down her cheeks.

 

“No, Pam!  I deserve to know!”

 

Roy closes the space between them in two large steps and grabs hold of Pam’s arm. 

 

And that’s it.

 

Everything that happens next is a blur for Jim, but he feels the crunch of bones under his fist, and he feels something wet spatter across face.  He hears everyone shouting—Roy and Karen and Pam and himself.  And then he feels someone pushing firmly on his chest.  It takes him a second to realize that it’s Pam, and only then does he take stock of what’s going on around him.

 

Roy is doubled over, nursing a broken nose, and Pam is holding Jim back.  And Jim realizes that he just punched Roy.

 

Jim takes a deep, ragged breath and glances down at Pam.  She’s not crying anymore, but the tear tracks stand out clearly on her cheeks.  His face softens.  He nods at her, and she relaxes her hands. 

 

“I’m not sorry,” he says gruffly.

 

“Okay,” she says quietly.

 

They stand like that for a moment, her hands loosely resting on his chest, looking at each other but not saying anything.  It distantly occurs to Jim that he shouldn’t be standing like this with her when his girlfriend is standing five yards away and her violent ex is standing even closer.  It probably occurs to her too.

 

But neither of them moves.  Neither of them tries to speak.  They just look straight at each other and don’t do a thing.  He feels like all of the nerve endings in his body have been relocated to the two spots on his chest where her hands are resting.  It feels like her palms are searing his skin through his shirt.  The sensation makes his breathing ragged and shaky. 

 

He reaches out with one hand to touch her arm where Roy had grabbed it.  His fingers tease lightly over the skin, stroking it up and down, and her breath hitches.

 

Out of nowhere comes a loud mechanic screeching and they break apart.

 

Without either of them noticing, Roy has stumbled over to his truck and managed to start it up.

 

“Roy, no!” Pam shouts.

 

Roy is fumbling with the gear shift and cursing because he’s jarring his injured hand.  He’s actually going to try to drive home.

 

Pam starts to move toward the truck, but Jim gently grasps her forearm.  She looks up at him.

 

“Don’t.  Just call the police,” he says.  It’s not a command.  It’s a plea.

 

Pam looks away and nods faintly.  They hear Roy curse loudly at both of them.  He peels out of the driveway in reverse, and then guns it forward, taking a detour across Jim’s front yard so that he leaves deep tire tracks in the grass.

 

There is a pause during which neither of them look at each other, or at Karen, whom Jim isn’t entirely sure is even standing with them anymore.  Then Jim breaks the silence.

 

“He left his brother on my car.”

 

Pam’s eyes widen and she whips around to look at Jim’s car.  Sure enough, Kenny’s body is strewn across the hood of Jim’s car.  He’s drooling slightly.

 

“Oh crap,” Pam says.

 

“I mean, forgetting your jacket or your phone I can understand, but your brother?”

 

This is safe.  Jim can do this, make light of the situation.  There is too much that needs to be said and it’s terrifying.  This he can handle.

 

“When I call the cops I’ll tell them.  Maybe they can send someone to get him,” Pam says.  She’s back in logic mode.

 

“It’s just not good etiquette,” Jim continues, shaking his head disapprovingly. 

 

He sees Pam’s expression change.  She looks at him seriously.  It’s a look that suggests compassion and regret and trepidation all at once.

 

“Jim,” she says. 

 

That’s it.  It’s a request.  It’s her way of saying ‘we need to talk’ without actually saying it.  But Jim can’t let go of the façade just yet. 

 

“He should tie a string around his finger or something so this doesn’t happen again,” he says, but it lacks the playful tone of his previous statements.  He can’t quite pull it off.

 

“Jim,” she repeats. 

 

This time it sounds pleading.  Jim realizes that he’s not about to get any non-answers.  This is real.  This is happening right now.  They’re really going to talk about this, about everything.  He stops acting and looks apprehensively at her.  He feels his heart rate increase again.

 

“What is going on here?”

 

The voice sounds raw and desperate and wounded.

 

It takes Jim a second to realize that the question hasn’t come from either himself or from Pam. 

 

It takes him another second to realize that it came from Karen.

Karen is shell-shocked.

 

That’s the only way she can think to describe it. All of the turmoil unfolding is so far beyond her comprehension that there might as well be a pane of glass in front of her, separating her from the drama.

 

It’s as though she started watching a movie at the climax point. She has no concept of setup. She is hopelessly unaware of the complex story arch that had led up to this moment. She feels impotent and foolish, standing on her boyfriend’s front stoop while an entire side of his life that she’d only seen hints of until now comes out. It’s all rushing into focus at a speed so rapid that she can’t concentrate on any one thing.

 

So she just stands there while the spectacle progresses. Every now and then she blurts out an exclamation or a desperate question, but it’s about as useful as screaming at the characters on the television screen. The plot plows ahead with little notice of her interjections.

 

The revelations keep coming one after another.

 

Pam was engaged.

 

Jim kissed her twice, not once.

 

Neither of them were drunk the second time.

 

Pam had feelings for him, whatever that meant.

 

It’s an unrelenting barrage of truth and all Karen can think is, ‘He lied to me.’

 

It doesn’t even hurt. Not yet, but she’s knows vaguely that it will. It’s too new and nothing has sunk in. It’s like when you forget to turn off the stove and your hand grazes the burner. You feel a shock and you recoil, but you don’t know yet if it’s extreme heat or extreme cold or what just happened. Your body is just telling you that it’s bad.

 

That is how Karen feels, but instead of her body it’s her mind. Her mind is screaming at her to just leave, take her hand off the stove, walk away. But she’s just standing on his stoop, staying in this relationship, leaving her hand on the burner, and it’s getting worse and worse. She’s hurting herself, but she can’t force herself to move.

 

It’s not until she hears Roy’s truck start up that she jolts back into complete awareness. She sees her boyfriend standing inches apart from Pam. His fingers are curled gently around her forearm and she’s saying his name in a soft, pleading voice.

 

Are they really going to do this now? Are they going to pretend that she’s not there and talk it out?

 

“What the hell, Jim?” Karen calls out.

 

She wants it to sound strong and angry. Instead her voice betrays her and cracks halfway through the sentence, and she ends up sounding small and hurt.

 

Jim looks at her as if he’s only just remembered that she’s still standing there. And Karen knows right then.

 

It’s over.

 

He forgot she was there. She feels exceedingly stupid. She really thought that they could share one night where she could feel like he was completely there.

 

Karen has known from the start that she was more invested in the relationship than he was. That had never happened to her before. It was embarrassing for her. She wasn’t the type of girl who clung to her boyfriends with faithful adoration. She didn’t obsess over it if they didn’t return her calls. Screw them if they didn’t want to call her back. But with Jim she found herself indulging in all sorts of insecure behaviors that weren’t her at all.

 

Insecure is not a word that Karen would use to describe herself. Ever. But when Pam shifts uncomfortably beside Jim, who has yet to respond to Karen, and whispers to him, “I’m going to call the police,” all Karen wants to do is scream at Pam to stop leaning in so close to her boyfriend.

 

But he’s so obviously not hers that it would make the statement ridiculous. Pam walks toward her car. She leans on her driver’s side door and pulls out her cell phone.

 

However, Karen isn’t really looking at Pam. She’s still staring at Jim in a hurt, accusatory way.

 

“Karen, I… I don’t know what to tell you right now,” Jim says finally. His hands are stuffed in his pockets and he keeps alternating from looking at the ground at the door behind her, but never directly at her.

 

She can tell he’s being honest. He looks confused and resigned. But she’s not satisfied. She can’t let this happen again. She won’t be mollified by five more nights of long talks. They are going to deal with this right now.

 

“Okay. You don’t have to come up with an explanation,” she says. There is an angry edge to her voice that she can’t hide. “I just want to ask you two questions.”

 

He tilts his head a little and looks at her like she’s just told him she needs him to cut off his own hand. Like her demand is unthinkable, painful, too much. Normally one look from him can melt her irritation in an instant, but not this time.

 

“Can we do this tomorrow?” he asks pleadingly.

 

“No,” she responds firmly.

 

He pulls back a little. He frowns, and winces when he does so because the movement jars the cut on his face. She feels a small tug at her heart because she knows he’s been through too much tonight.

 

“Seriously?” he asks. There is a touch of resentment in his tone.

 

She feels for a moment like she’s being unreasonable. But then she remembers his angry admonishments from earlier tonight.

 

‘Face is fine, Karen. Thanks for asking.’

 

‘Jesus, Karen. Not. Now.’

 

What right did he have to dance around the issue now? It was his fault that it came to this. If he had just been honest with her in the first place they wouldn’t be here right now.

 

“Seriously,” she parrots back at him. He opens his mouth, and Karen is sure that an angry retort is about to come out, so she cuts him off.

 

“Jim, I’m just trying to piece together the parts of a story that you should have told me months ago. I’m not asking you to rehash your entire life to me. I just have two questions. Don’t you think that’s fair?” she says, struggling to keep her tone neutral.

 

Jim swallows whatever he had been planning on saying and sighs softly. He looks at her instead of behind her. She thinks that she sees remorse in his eyes. She’s not sure which part of the night’s events he’s feeling remorseful for.

 

“Okay,” he says quietly.

 

Karen lets out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding and nods. She throws a glance at Pam, but she seems engrossed in her phone conversation with the police.

 

“When you told Pam that you had feelings for her...” Karen pauses when she sees Jim’s reaction. He immediately looks back at the ground. His hands burrow deeper into his pockets, like he’s bracing himself.

 

“When you told her you had feelings, how did you say it?” she continues.

 

“Karen—” Jim starts.

 

“I’m pretty sure you didn’t say ‘Karen’ that night. It would have been awkward. You didn’t even know me yet,” Karen says. Her tone is lighter, but she isn’t smiling. Neither is he.

 

“I just don’t see why it matters how I said it,” he says stubbornly.

 

Karen is sick of the non-answers. Sick of him tiptoeing around the question. Sick of him trying to placate her. She feels malicious comments teasing their way out from between her lips before she can stop them.

 

“Was it, ‘Pam, I like like you?’ Was it, ‘Do you like me, circle yes, no, maybe?’”

 

He grits his teeth and looks up at her through narrowed eyes.

 

“No,” he bites out.

 

She feels contrite almost immediately. This doesn’t have to get nasty. This is not who you are, she repeats to herself. She’s asking a simple question. She knows what she’s afraid of, so she decides to ask it more directly.

 

“Did you use the word ‘love’?” she asks. She’s almost whispering but she’s not sure why. Pam is at least five yards away, still talking on the phone.

 

Jim’s eyes widen almost imperceptivity. He quickly looks away in an attempt to cover his surprise, but it doesn’t escape her notice. It takes him only a second to compose himself. He looks back at her and opens his mouth to say something, but falters again. He blinks a few times and then seems to give up. He lets the air out of his lungs in a resigned sigh. And she knows.

 

“Of course you did,” she whispers, and she knows that he hears her. She is horrified to feel pinpricks of moisture in the corners of her eyes, and fights furiously to keep the tears from forming. She will not cry.

 

“Karen,” Jim says quietly. His expression conveys guilt and pity, and she can’t stand it.

 

“One more question,” she says, cutting him off before he can fall over himself seeking forgiveness. “Why did you ask me to come here?”

 

He straightens up immediately.

 

“Come on,” he says, exasperated.

 

Karen plows ahead, unmoved.

 

“Yup, that’s what you said. ‘Come on, Karen. I think you should come to Scranton.’”

 

She looks at him expectantly. He looks back at her as if he can’t believe that she’s really going to make him explain himself. ‘How can he be so surprised?’ Karen wonders. He apparently overcomes his shock, because he starts to respond.

 

“I asked you to come because I like you,” he says, and Karen has to struggle not to cut him off immediately. “I didn’t want to never see you again. I thought that we could be good together, and I didn’t want to let that opportunity slip away.”

 

He looks at her with an expression that seems to say, Well, are you happy now? Karen is not happy.

 

“I don’t think that’s why,” she says simply.

 

Jim throws his hands up in the air.

 

“Well if you think you know, then why did you ask?” he asks angrily.

 

“I was a buffer,” she says, ignoring his outburst. He doesn’t get to be the angry one in this conversation.

 

“No, Karen,” Jim quickly amends. “You were not a buffer. You’re funny, and beautiful, and amazing.”

 

“So I was a funny, beautiful, amazing buffer,” Karen says brusquely.

 

“No—” he starts, but Karen is still talking.

 

She has to make Jim admit what he’s doing. She doesn’t know why she doesn’t just accept his explanation. It’s so much more pleasing.

 

“Hey, as far as buffers go, that’s pretty impressive. Buffers just have to be able to buff. I was like a quadruple threat.”

 

She’s smiling now, but it’s an ugly smile. She knows that she’s being spiteful again. She’s just protecting herself. It hurts too much, but she has to get the truth out there. So she puts on this unaffected bravado, this false indifference. Because it hurts too much to admit that she was falling for him when she knows that he was never going to fall for her.

 

“It wasn’t like that,” Jim says earnestly.

 

Karen softens for a second. He seems to truly believe what he’s saying.

 

“I’ll cut the crap Jim. I’ll stop with the sarcasm,” she pauses. She looks at him without trying to hide how she feels. She lets the hurt and the humiliation show openly on her face.

 

“I feel used,” she says.

 

Jim doesn’t look away. He lets out a small sigh.

 

“I’m sorry,” he says.

 

“Sorry that I feel used or sorry that you used me?” she asks, because she truly isn’t sure.

 

He shakes his head.

 

“Karen, I wasn’t using you. I never saw it like that,” he says, and she knows he’s being sincere.

 

She smiles. It’s a small smile, and it hurts a little to let it creep onto her face.

 

“Of course you didn’t, Jim,” she says. “You’re not a bad guy. Only a really despicable guy would consciously use a girl like that. I honestly believe that you didn’t know what you were doing.”

 

Jim stiffens at her statement. She realizes that to him it still sounds like an accusation.

 

“I’m not using you,” he insists.

 

It occurs to Karen that she’s going to have to be the one to do it. He’s not going to break up with her, at least not tonight. He actually expects her to go home, sleep on it, and talk it out tomorrow over coffee. He probably wants time to sort things out in his mind, time to create delicate phrasing that won’t hurt her feelings. That is so him.

 

Well, she doesn’t want his pity or his sympathy. She doesn’t want to play the clueless, clingy girlfriend anymore.

 

She decides immediately that she’s not going to quit her job. Quitting would be admitting that she moved all the way to Scranton for a man she barely knew. She is not the type of woman to do something like that.

 

Ignore the fact that it’s exactly what she did.

 

She can fix that now. Rewrite history. Staying there will show that she moved for her career. She’ll talk to Jan about opportunities for advancement within the company on Monday.

 

Jim’s voice breaks through her thoughts.

 

“Karen, I mean it,” he says.

 

His voice shocks her back into the present. She remembers that she’s still standing there with him. She looks behind him and sees that Pam is done with her call. She’s hanging back by her car, warily eyeing Karen and Jim and trying to pretend that she isn’t. And Karen realizes that she’s broken up with Jim in her mind, but he doesn’t know it yet. She has to say something.

 

“Well, I’ve got my answers,” she says. Jim looks at her imploringly. “So, I think it’s pretty obvious that this is over,” she continues. She sounds business-like. Matter-of-fact.

 

Jim looks honestly surprised.

 

“What?” he scoffs.

 

“I’m leaving,” Karen says.

 

She’s already walking away. She has to leave now. Take her hand off the stove. She’s already badly burned and it’s time to start the healing process. She hates to admit just how deep the burn is. How close she was to using the L-word with him. She’s incredibly relieved that she resisted, but it doesn’t change the fact that she knows.

 

She thought she was in love.

 

It makes the burn that much deeper.

 

“Karen, just wait,” he calls out.

 

Karen whirls around to face him, feeling the pain and embarrassment all over again like a fresh wound.

 

“No, Jim. I’ve been ‘just waiting’ for way too long. I just feel like a complete idiot,” she shouts.

 

She hates that she’s shouting. She can’t control herself anymore. She wants to keep up the calm exterior and she’s so close to pulling it off. She just has to leave now.

 

“What are you talking about?” Jim asks.

 

Why can’t he just let her leave? Let her go home and lose it there? He has caught up with her at the foot of the driveway, and Karen struggles to keep her restraint from slipping away. She won’t do this in front of him. In front of her. She shoots another glance at Pam, who is now watching the two of them openly, looking concerned.

 

“You know what? I’m not even mad anymore!” Karen says loudly.

 

She starts to laugh, a quiet chuckle because the whole situation is ridiculous. But the laughter doesn’t last long and she feels those damn tears building in the corners of her eyes again.

 

“I’m just...” she stops talking for a moment. She has to focus all of her energy on not allowing the tears to fall. She takes a deep breath in and out, and looks up at the sky, hoping that the open air will dry the moisture in her eyes.

 

“I’m just so tired of this,” she says, and she sounds as exhausted as she feels. “I can’t do this anymore.”

 

To her surprise, Jim reels back and throws his hands in the air again.

 

“Oh come on! What the hell is going on tonight?” he shouts.

 

He has clearly reached his quota in drama for the night, Karen realizes. She has too, so she decides.

 

“Exactly,” is all she replies.

 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jim asks in annoyance.

 

Karen shrugs her shoulders and lets out a sad laugh.

 

“It means that I’m done. I’m so done. I can’t. This—” she pauses and gestures between the two of them. “This is making me into someone I’m not. I’m pretty sure that it’s doing the same thing to you. And I just can’t do it anymore.”

 

“Karen, I’m begging you. Just for tonight. Just don’t. Please? I can’t deal with anything else tonight,” Jim pleads.

 

Karen feels a surge of irritation. She’s giving him an easy out. Why can’t he just take it?

 

“Why do you even want me?” she asks. It comes out harsher than she wanted it to.

 

“What?” he asks.

 

“Why do you want to keep me around? Pam is single again. Why don’t you just go for it with her? You obviously want to,” she says.

 

Again it comes out sounding harsh and reproachful. She can’t help it.

 

Jim is flustered, and seems unable to form a coherent response. He makes a couple of false starts, but ultimately falls silent. He looks contemplative.

 

With every second that the silence continues Karen feels the pain and humiliation intensify. It’s as though he’s realizing that their entire relationship was a distraction—something keeping him from the person he really wanted all along.

 

Karen can’t stand there for another second.

 

“Asshole,” she mutters. She turns and marches determinedly in the direction of her house.

 

“Karen, wait. Come on,” Jim calls to her.

 

“No, Jim. I’m walking the two blocks home. Don’t follow me,” Karen says resolutely.

 

She doesn’t look back to see his face. She just continues to walk away. Her hand is off the burner. The shock of the initial contact is gone, and all she feels now is a deep throbbing pain. She knows it will go away eventually. It has to.

 

***

 

 

Jim can’t believe that this is happening. The whole night has been like something straight out of a soap opera. He distantly wonders what could happen next. Maybe Dwight will show up and announce that he wants Pam to be the mother of a new batch of thirsty Schrute babies.

 

He shudders when horrifying images involving Pam and Dwight and beets run through his mind, and quickly tries to think of anything else. He focuses on Karen’s retreating form. She hasn’t hesitated, hasn’t looked back.

 

It’s really over.

 

He feels exhausted but relieved. He never had a specific plan to break up with Karen, but he always knew that they wouldn’t last. It was just easy to stay with her. Comforting. Distracting. And then it hits him.

 

He was using her. She was a buffer.

 

And he feels like an ass.

 

Jim is not the type of guy who uses women. He tries to reassure himself with this thought. But then he remembers Katy. What was she?

 

He’s such an ass.

 

He hates himself right now. His face is throbbing and his car is currently serving as a mattress to a large, drunken man who thinks that he’s owed a new pair of jet skis, but Jim sort of thinks he deserves it.

 

Especially when he glances back at Pam and feels his pulse jump.

 

It jumps because he realizes suddenly that Karen is right. Pam is single again and so is he. They’re alone at his place, save for an unconscious man, and she’s looking at him in an anxious, fidgety way that makes him feel dizzy.

 

“The police will come by and pick Kenny up in a little while,” Pam says. She’s making her way toward him, tugging nervously at the bottom of her jacket. “They have their guys keeping a lookout for Roy’s truck. They say that you should go to the station tomorrow to give them a statement if you’re going to press charges.”

 

She stops a couple of feet away from him and shifts uncomfortably. She looks like she wants to say something, but she doesn’t. They just stand there for a moment while she fidgets with her jacket.

 

He’s not sure if he’ll go to the station tomorrow. He doesn’t want to press charges for the assault, which he figures he pretty much earned by kissing another man’s fiancée, but there’s his car to think about.

 

“Okay,” he says quietly.

 

It feels like he’s living in a snow globe that’s just been vigorously shook. The chaos of the original quaking is over, but he’s still floating through the water. He hasn’t come down yet. His feet haven’t hit the base of the globe. He’s just drifting in the midst of the pieces of his world, which are similarly uprooted and drifting with him.

 

“This night…” Pam says. Her voice trails off. She just sighs and shakes her head and looks down at her fidgeting hands.

 

He wants to reach out and cover her hands with his to quiet their agitated movement. He wants to pull her hands away from the hem of her jacket and tug her toward him and lock his hands behind her waist. He wants to feel her hands rest on his back and her face fall gently forward onto his chest. He wants to just hold her like that, because they both just need a moment to breathe. But instead he shoves his hands back into his pockets.

 

“Yeah,” is all he says.

 

There is another uncomfortable pause. Pam looks back up at him and they hold each other’s gaze for a moment. Then she smiles. It seems somewhat forced. It’s a small gesture, but he knows that she’s trying to lessen the prolonged awkwardness that has settled over them.

 

“Hey, um, you have a little blood,” she says suddenly, pointing toward his face.

 

“Where?” he asks, raising his hand to his cheek.

 

“Right about… here,” she says, motioning at his entire face and neck.

 

The small smile has growing into a subtle smirk. He feels the corners of his mouth tugging upward too.

 

“Very funny,” he says.

 

She’s amazing, he thinks.

 

“Seriously, we should get you cleaned up,” she says motioning toward the door.

 

His pulse does that funny skipping thing again, and he’s genuinely wondering if he should get it checked out by a doctor because it doesn’t seem like it should be happening so often.

The thought of the two of them in his house, alone, sends a surge of heat through his body, from his feet all the way up through the top of his head. He tries to tell himself that he is the biggest jerk on the planet for feeling this way. His girlfriend… ex-girlfriend… just stormed off to spend the night hurt and alone because of him, and this is what he’s thinking about?

 

“What about him?” Jim asks. He gestures at Kenny, who is currently nestled into the deep v-bend he created on the hood of Jim’s car.

 

“Well, the police said they might be a while. I’m sure they’ll knock when they get here if they need anything,” Pam responds.

 

He nods and she takes a few steps toward his front door while he just stands there, watching her. This is really happening. They are finally going to sit down and talk about things.

 

She turns around when she realizes that he isn’t following her. She looks at him questioningly, and he snaps out of his daze.

 

When he comes up beside her, an unwelcome thought occurs to him. What if she tries to avoid the issue again? What if she falls back on non-answers? What if the only reason that she seemed so close to really talking before was that her defenses were weakened from the anxiety and chaos? He frowns at this.

 

They are at his front door and he’s reaching for the door handle when he makes a decision. He won’t let her do that again. He won’t let her get away with non-answers. If she tries that, he’ll just have to find some way of redirecting her.

 

He pulls the door open for her, and when she starts to walk through it he gets the irrepressible urge to touch her. And then realizes that he doesn’t have to repress it anymore.

 

So when she’s halfway through the doorway, he reaches out and catches her hand in his, just for a second. He feels her jump and stiffen, but she doesn’t pull away. He doesn’t hold on for long. Their palms kiss for just an instant before separating again. He lets her fingers slip away, and that just increases the sensation of his skin gliding over hers. The trails that her fingertips trace across his palm feel electrified, his nerve endings so sensitive that it’s almost painful.

 

Their hands separate and Jim remembers to breathe. He follows closely after her and pulls the door shut behind them.

At first she thinks that it’s an accident.

 

It happens all the time; hands brush unintentionally. But this isn’t a brush. It’s a caress. She can tell because when she jumps their hands don’t immediately fall apart. They don’t. Because it’s not a simple accidental brush. It’s a purposeful embrace.

 

She feels his fingers skim across her palm and then back again. In between those electrifying moments their palms meet for a brief second and Pam thinks that he might hold on.

 

But of course he doesn’t.

 

He’s always meeting her in the middle, waiting for her to carry them the rest of the way. It’s not until after their hands separate that she realizes that maybe he was waiting for her to grasp on, to hold his hand in hers. But it’s too late now.

 

She remembers feeling both of his hands slip out of hers last May. How she looked down and saw his hands slide halfway out of her grasp, then pause for just a second. How she gripped his fingers, squeezed once, and then she just let go. She just let go and watched his hands slide the rest of the way out of hers and disappear. And then he disappeared.

 

But thoughts of last May quickly retreat when she feels the phantom pressure of his chest against her back. He’s close. Not so close that he’s actually touching her, but close enough that she can feel him there.

 

She hears him let out an unsteady breath. He just pulled the door shut behind them, and she realizes that she has to move first because he’s stuck between her body and the door.

 

She takes a shaky, too-large step forward, and her back suddenly feels cold. She turns around nervously. He hasn’t moved from the doorway. In fact, he’s leaning back against the surface of the door casually, as if he didn’t just break up with his girlfriend in front of her. As if he didn’t just grab her hand and leave her breathless. As if his face isn’t covered in blood and developing a deep purple bruise.

 

She takes in a loud, unnecessary breath.

 

“You should… I mean, do you need help with…” her voice trails of and she motions at injured his cheek.

 

“Oh,” Jim says, as if he had forgotten all about the reason for their being in his house. “Yeah, no. I think I can handle it. My mom got me this ridiculously extensive first-aid kit when I first left for college. I still have it… In my bathroom, I think.”

 

He pushes himself off the door abruptly and moves toward what Pam guesses is his bathroom. He said he didn’t need her help, but he didn’t tell her what he expects her to do while he’s fixing himself. So she takes off her coat but leaves her sneakers on. She drapes the coat over a chair and looks absently around his living room.

 

It looks different from his old house. She remembers that his old house had strands of white and multicolored Christmas lights, sports posters and random art sprawling across the walls, and mismatched but comfortable-looking furniture.

 

Now there are no Christmas lights. There is recessed lighting and a couple of (matching) floor lamps. Maybe the sports posters were Mark’s, because the only art she sees is a couple of framed prints. He has a boxy, ancient looking television set up in one corner of the room, so she figures that Mark owned the large flat-screen she remembers. All of his furniture matches. It could be that he’s renting and the furniture came with the house. She prefers that explanation over the thought of him and Karen going furniture shopping together, but then she reminds herself that it’s okay, because that relationship is over. She thinks.

 

She hears the sound of running water and decides to follow the sound. She finds Jim standing in front of a bathroom sink with a half-soaked blue washcloth in his right hand and a myriad of first-aid supplies strewn across the tile countertop. She sees antiseptic in the form of wipes, tubes, and sprays. There are rolls of gauze, Band-Aids of all shapes and sizes, ace bandages, cold packs, heat packs, pain reliever, even a sling and a medical handbook.

 

He hasn’t noticed her yet. He focused on dabbing the blood from his face with the wet cloth. He’s working on a spot directly beneath his lower lip, and she wonders vaguely if the blood is his or Roy’s.

 

He catches her reflection in the mirror and jumps a little.

 

“Hey,” he says.

 

“You weren’t kidding about that first-aid kit, were you?” she quips, because it’s safe to say stupid things like that right now.

 

“Yeah, I’m pretty sure that this is also second and third aid,” he replies, finishing up his chin.

 

Most of his face is clean now, and the elimination of a layer of blood has revealed the full extent of the cut on his cheek. It’s not too long, but it looks jagged and painful. He tries to apply some antiseptic, the kind from the tube, and he winces—once, twice—and she winces with him.

 

He notices this and says, “It’s really not that bad.”

 

She almost laughs, because it is that bad. This whole night is something straight out of a soap opera. Her jealous ex just showed up at his house, punched him, and simultaneously ruined his relationship with another woman. She manages to hold back the laugh, but a small, pained smile steals its way onto her lips.

 

“Are you sure I can’t help?” she asks.

 

He catches her eye in the mirror. He just looks at her for a moment, like he’s trying to read her face, and she looks away uncomfortably.

 

“Yeah,” he says finally. “Why don’t you heat up some water for tea? The kettle’s on the stove.”

 

She frowns.

 

“I didn’t think you drank tea,” she says.

 

He screws the top back on the antiseptic.

 

“I don’t. But you look pretty shook up, and I know that you like tea when you need to relax,” he says matter-of-factly.

 

He’s perusing through a pile of bandages so he doesn’t see her eyes flood with tears, but she turns away nonetheless. She has to turn away. She can’t continue to look at the purple welt on his face when he just said something so selfless and so perfectly him, the old him. If she does, she’s afraid that the silent flood will transform into embarrassing sobs.

 

“I’m going to go change when I finish in here,” he says, and she nods without looking at him.

 

She slips out of the doorway and listens to the squeak of her Keds as she moves toward where she thinks the kitchen is. She guesses right, and she manages not to think of anything at all while she fills his silver kettle and replaces it on the stove. Only after she turns the dial for the burner does she become lost in her thoughts again.

 

She only heard the end of their fight. She had just hung up with the police and she distinctly heard Karen tell Jim, “Pam is single again. Why don’t you just go for it with her? You obviously want to.” Her stomach flipped when she heard the question, but Jim never responded. And what did the absence of a response mean? She feels like she’s being swallowed by her doubt and fear and confusion.

 

Once when she was in high school, Roy took her to the state fair. He talked her into going on one of those spinney rides that go up and down while they spin. She warned him that she had motion sickness, but he assured her that he would yell for the ride operator to stop things if she felt ill.

 

As soon as the ride started, Pam clutched the safety bar and leaned into Roy’s shoulder and pressed her eyes shut as tightly as possible. She was terrified. She was at the mercy of a rickety mechanical nightmare, being pushed and pulled and twirled, getting more nauseous and frightened with every rotation. She couldn’t open her eyes, couldn’t tell Roy that she needed it to stop. But she didn’t throw up. Not then.

 

When the ride ended, Roy pried her from the seat and guided her back out onto the fairway. Standing so still after the violent, uncontrollable jerking of the ride somehow made her feel shakier than before. It was then, on the solid ground of the fairway that she threw up all over Roy’s new tennis shoes.

 

That is exactly how she feels now. The ride is over, and now everything is still and quiet, and she somehow feels dizzier than ever. Only this time she’s not worried about throwing up. She’s worried about a number of other things.

 

What was going to happen when he came back out of his room? What did he expect from her? Would he be cold and distant? Would he try to play everything off as a joke? Would he ask her to leave so that he could just forget this whole night ever happened? Or, and Pam felt more dread at this prospect than any of the others, would he want to talk? Really talk.

 

She gasps audibly when she looks up to see him standing in the doorway to the kitchen. He’s wearing a green striped sweater and a pair of jeans. His face looks fine on one side, but the other side makes her wince sympathetically again. The cut is hidden by two butterfly Band-Aids, but the deep purple bruising peaks out from beneath it. His eye is a little swollen, the lower lid puffy and purple like his cheek.

 

“I’m so sorry,” she says. She can’t help herself from saying it. Her voice cracks halfway through the ‘sorry’ part.

 

“For what?” he asks.

 

It should be simple to answer, but it’s not. It’s a loaded question. She’s sorry for so much. The cut and bruise on his face, his car, his breakup. But beyond tonight…

 

She’s so sorry for not being brave and honest. For choosing Roy over him. But she can’t bring herself to say any of those answers, although she knows she should say them all.

 

She stands in the middle of his kitchen with her mouth hanging open, looking straight at him but unable to say anything. She always feels so damn useless at times like these. She feels so weak and cowardly and undeserving. Her vision grows blurry and she’s horrified to realize that tears are gathering there again. She feels one plump teardrop escape her eye and quickly swipes at it with the edge of her sleeve.

 

She looks down at the wet corner of her sleeve, because she can’t look at him. She doesn’t want him to show concern for her again like he did in the bathroom. She can’t handle his concern for her after everything that happened to him tonight. It just makes her realize with increasing pain and humiliation just how stupid she was to hesitate for even a second last May. How stupid she was to choose Roy over him.

 

She hears his socked feet padding determinedly across the linoleum floor and her heart races. She just wants to turn away, run. But all too soon she feels him near her. She refuses to look up, and hates herself when she feels two, three, four more tears fall. She lets out a shaky breath and waits for him to say something. Do something. But he doesn’t.

 

He just stands in front of her. She hears his breathing, deep and a little hoarse. She’s looking down, so all she sees is his feet. His figure casts a shadow over her, not because he’s looming threateningly above her. Just because he’s so tall that he’s blocking some of the light from the overhead kitchen lamp. It’s likely that only a few seconds have passed, but to Pam it feels far too long.

 

She expects him to touch her, maybe reach for her hand again, but he doesn’t. They just stand like that. She knows that he’s waiting for her to do something. It’s her turn. He’s too close and she’s managed to stop the tears, but she’s afraid that if she looks up and sees that bruise again she’ll lose it.

 

And then her reprieve comes in the form of a whistling teakettle.

 

“The water,” she says abruptly.

 

Without waiting for his response, she starts to brush past him, but he reaches out and catches her elbow. She pauses, but doesn’t look at him even now. Her eyes are focused on the steam jetting out from the spout of the teakettle. Somehow the beating of her heart sounds louder than the screaming kettle.

 

“We need to talk,” he says.

 

She feels heat rising from her chest to her neck, creeping up her cheeks. The screaming of the kettle echoes in her ears and she imagines screaming like that herself, just screaming and letting out all of the fear and regret.

 

She doesn’t respond. He releases her arm and she lets out a ragged breath before she makes it to the stove. She pulls the kettle off the heat and flips the burner off, and she thinks about how much she wishes that she could take herself off the fire right now. Her insides are bursting, the pressure is painful, and she can’t just talk. That would make everything better. He wants to talk, so just talk damn it. Just tell him. Why is it so hard?

 

She finds the cupboard with his mugs on her first try and realizes that she doesn’t have a teabag. She can’t just search through his cupboards with him standing right there. She has to ask him.

 

“Where do you keep your teabags?” She means for it to sound normal, but her throat is tight and it comes out as a whisper.

 

There is a pause and she manages to look back at him, heart still pounding. He’s still standing where she left him, frowning.

 

“Jim?” she says.

 

He lets out a little breathy laugh, and she can’t understand how or why he would laugh right now.

 

“Um. I just realized. I, uh, I don’t have any teabags,” he stutters. He lets out another breathy laugh, and she finds herself doing the same.

 

“Oh, um…” she mumbles, trying to think of something to say.

 

“Yeah. That totally didn’t occur to me,” he says, and he’s smiling now.

 

“Teabags are a vital ingredient in tea,” she says, almost teasingly. It amazes her that they’re back in comfortable territory already. She can breathe for now.

 

“Really?” he asks. She nods seriously. “Interesting,” he says.

 

They both let out those sighing chuckles again, and their eyes dart nervously from the kettle to each other and around the kitchen at random.

 

“I have some cocoa,” he adds.

 

“Cocoa, Halpert? Really?” she says, in what is now definitely a teasing tone.

 

“Oh yeah. The Swiss Miss kind too. I don’t go for the cheap stuff,” he says.

 

She smiles.

 

“Is it the kind with the little marshmallows?” she asks.

 

“Is there any other kind?”

 

“No other kind worth buying,” she says, grinning now.

 

“Are you interested?” he asks, already rummaging through a cabinet and pulling out a cylindrical tin of cocoa.

 

“It’s really tempting to just down a mug of hot water, but I guess I could be persuaded to add a bit of cocoa,” she replies.

 

She pours some of the water into her mug and puts out her hand for the tin of cocoa, but he’s not looking at her. He’s grabbing a spoon from a drawer on the other side of the kitchen. Once he finds one, he doesn’t hand over the supplies to her. Instead he stands behind her, just like he did at the front door. He pops the top off the tin and spoons two scoops of cocoa into her mug, leaning into her when he does so.

 

It’s not obscene. She’s had men press against her in elevators and in line at the grocery store, creeps who do that sort of thing for kicks. This is just the lightest amount of pressure on her back, feather-light contact that nonetheless makes goose bumps stand out on the back of her neck. His breath is stirring the wispy hairs by her left ear as he reaches around her and stirs the cocoa. When he abandons the spoon in her mug, she expects him to step back. Instead she feels his breath, hot against her cheek.

 

“We really need to talk,” he whispers into her ear.

 

She closes her eyes and a shudder goes through her body. She knows that he felt it. She knows that he’s aware of what he’s doing to her.

 

Her eyes are still closed when she responds.

 

“I know.”

 

And she knows that it’s time. She still feels the fear, but even more than that she feels an overwhelming desire to just do it. Just talk, let it out, relieve the pressure.

She’s ready.

A piece of her hair is tickling his nose. 

 

Here he is, standing close behind her, whispering in her ear, trying to be… sexy?  He’s embarrassed to even think of himself trying to act sexy.  He felt her shudder when he leaned in close to her ear and spoke softly, but he doesn’t consider himself to be a sexy guy.  He’s a normal guy.  He’s not one of the guys you find on the cover of a harlequin romance novel.  He can be funny and charming, that he knows.  But sexy?  No.  He can’t believe it.

 

The evidence of his romantic ineptitude is becoming painfully clear with each passing moment.  It’s that damn curly hair, the hair that he normally loves but that right now is triggering the incredibly un-sexy urge to sneeze.  He doesn’t have time to pull back from her so instead he leans forward, pressing her body hard into the kitchen counter.  He hears her gasp, and he is hit by the humiliating realization that she thinks he’s about to do something sexy.  Maybe bend her over the counter and run his hands down her sides.  Maybe kiss his way down the side of her neck.  Maybe spin her around and hoist her onto the counter, cocoa be damned, and ravish her right there.

 

Instead he leans forward and sneezes directly into her cocoa.

 

It’s a wet sneeze too.  Some spit (okay, a lot of spit) comes out of his mouth and lands in her mug.  He just thanks whatever higher power is watching that there isn’t snot involved.

 

There is a momentary pause during which neither of them moves.  She is still pressed firmly between the lower kitchen cabinets and his body, her hands tightly gripping the counter’s edge. 

 

Then he leaps away from her as if he’s been burned.

 

“I’m sorry,” he blurts out.  “Your hair… tickled.”

 

She still hasn’t turned around, but he sees her shoulders start to shake.  And then he hears it.  Giggling.  She’s giggling at him.  He is never going to make it onto the cover of Harlequin, he decides, and he gives up and lets out a low chuckle.

 

“Yeah, yeah.  Laugh it up, Beesley.”

 

She spins around and he’s taken aback because of how beautiful she looks.  She has a huge grin on her face, and he hasn’t seen a smile that big on her face in a long time.  She’s so beautiful when she smiles.

 

“You can have that cup of cocoa, since you’ve sullied it with your saliva.”

 

“That saliva does not sully anything.  They could bottle that stuff and sell it,” he says, mock-offended.

 

“Okay, Dwight,” Pam says, smirking.

 

“Uncalled for!” Jim says indignantly, and Pam giggles again.  “Low blow, Beesley!”

 

“If it’s just the same to you, I think I’ll pour myself a new mug,” she replies, still smiling.

 

“Suit yourself.”

 

She pulls another mug from his cabinet and makes herself a new cup of cocoa.  He grabs her old mug.  He takes a tentative sip, giving her a sheepish smile which she returns with another brilliant grin.  She stirs her cocoa and places the spoon in the sink.  When she turns back to him, she is no longer smiling.  She looks determined and a little scared.

 

“Let’s talk,” she says.

 

He can hardly believe his ears.  She’s ready.  They’re really going to do this.

 

He nods and motions toward his small kitchen table.  He pulls out a chair for her, and she looks at him with what seems like pain in her eyes, as if his kind gesture somehow hurts her.

 

They sit there for a moment in silence.  He wants her to speak first.  He doesn’t want to have to force her to say anything.  He’s not Roy.  He’s better than that.  He’s waited for years for this moment.  He can wait another few seconds.

 

She nods to herself, as if steeling her resolve, and then she looks directly into his eyes.

 

“I want to just say something to you.  I just want to get it all out at once.  Can I do that?”

 

“Of course,” he says.

 

“Sometimes I wish you never came back,” she says abruptly.

 

He did not expect that.  He frowns and pulls back a little, peering at her inquiringly.

 

“Wow, um…” he says, unable form a response. 

 

What is he supposed to say to that?  Apparently he isn’t supposed to say anything, because she’s continuing.

 

“Because… I mean…” She’s struggling too.  It seems painful for her to speak.  “After you left, this is going to sound stupid.  But it was like… It was like I had to grieve.  You were gone.  You were never coming back.  Out of nowhere.  Like when someone dies in a car crash or something.  Just disappeared.  So I grieved or… whatever.  It was so hard to look up at your desk and see Ryan sitting there.  It was…”

 

She breaks off, blinking away the moisture gathering in her eyes.  He never knew that she thought of it like that, but in a way it makes sense.  Because as dramatic as it sounds, he felt like he died that night.  It was just over for him.  That life was over.  He had to make a new one.

 

She takes a deep breath and continues.

 

“But then it got better.  Little by little.  I started having fun again.  I started pranking Dwight, all on my own.  I planned a funeral for a bird,” she pauses and smiles a little.  Jim remembers that Creed told him something about a bird funeral, but he had brushed it off as the older man’s usual nonsensical ranting.

 

“It was… I was good,” she continues.  “I really thought that maybe I could move on.  That I could go back to normal, or at least create a new sort of normal.”

 

A new sort of normal.  Jim can relate to that.  He tried to do the same thing in Stamford.

 

“And then when I found out about the merger, I was ecstatic.  I couldn’t even hide it from the cameras.  I was… giddy,” she smiles to herself, as if remembering her excitement.  Jim feels guilty because his reaction when he heard about the merger was so entirely different.  It felt like a death sentence.  It felt like someone was punishing him, sending him right back to where he started.

 

“It was like you had been brought back from the dead,” she says, and he blinks in surprise because her thoughts are a mirror opposite of his.  “I know that sounds stupid, but it was like this amazing second chance.”

 

Second chance?  Did that mean… Jim can’t really let himself believe it yet.  He needs to hear her say it.  Why can’t she just say it?  He needs to know.

 

“But then you were there and it wasn’t the same.  You had evolved,” she says the last word with unveiled contempt, and he almost blushes, remembering when he said it to her.  She looks so pained right now, and he wants her to stop.  He doesn’t want to hear about how much he hurt her anymore.

 

“And it was so much harder.  Harder even than when you left the first time.  Because you really were gone this time, gone for good, even though you were right there in front of me.  You were physically there, and it was like this constant reminder of everything that I had lost.  There was no second chance.”

 

She’s crying again.  Not blubbering, not even sniffling, but two tears are making their way down her cheeks.  He can’t focus on that.  He wants her to say it.  He just wants to know.

 

“Pam, are you saying… When you say second chance, does that mean… When Roy said out there—” he stutters, but she cuts him off.

 

“No.  I’m not done.  You don’t get to jump ahead to the end.  You wanted to talk, so let’s talk,” He’s surprised by the anger in her voice.  “I’m… you can’t just brush past everything else I just said.  I’m mad.  I’m mad at you Jim.”

 

“You’re mad at me?” he blusters.  Now how does that work?  He was the one with the broken heart.  He was the one who laid himself out there and got pushed away last May.

 

“Oh, you’re mad at me too?” she snaps.  “What did I do?  Was I not sad enough for you?  Did I not look pathetic enough when you came back with a new girlfriend?  When I asked you out for coffee and you told me that you were seeing someone?”

 

This talk has turned ugly too fast.  Jim’s not even sure how it happened, but Pam is sitting across from him with an unpleasant look on her face, sounding entirely un-Pamlike and he doesn’t like it.

 

“Stop it.  That’s not how it was,” he says firmly.

 

Her face softens, but she’s still frowning.

 

“When did you start dating her?” she asks.

 

His heart jumps into his throat.  He knows where this is going, and he can’t defend himself from this one.

 

“That shouldn’t matter.  It’s over.”  He knows it’s a copout, but at the same time, it’s true.  Can’t they just move on from this?  Do they have to talk about Karen?

 

“Was it before you knew about the merger?” she prods.

 

He doesn’t respond.  He just looks away and shakes his head slightly, not in response to her question, but just because he wants to be anywhere but here right now.

 

“Jim, did you start dating her after you knew you were coming back?” she asks, and he knows that she already knows the answer.  Why does she want him to say it?

 

She’s not talking, and he’s forced to say something.

 

“Pam,” is all he says.  His tone is pleading.  He knows that she can fill in the rest herself.  Pam, please just stop.

 

“How could you do that?” she asks. 

 

The angry voice is back, and it confuses him again.  Why does she get to be angry?  She had no claim on him.  Was he supposed to wait for her forever, even after she turned him down?  He was perfectly justified in dating whomever he wanted.

 

“Excuse me?” he replies.

 

“Were you punishing me?” she demands, her eyes burning.  “Was it some sort of—”

 

“Just stop it!” Jim snaps.  He knows exactly why he was dating Karen.  Karen herself had pointed that out to him earlier that evening.  Pam had no idea what he went through in Stamford.

 

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he accuses.  “It wasn’t like that at all.  You think that I was punishing you?  Pam, I was protecting myself!  You gave me no indication, I had no idea if you… I couldn’t come back and fall into the same pattern.  I couldn’t do that to myself again.”

 

She is quiet for a moment.

 

“You wouldn’t even talk to me,” she says softly.

 

“That’s not true,” he says stubbornly.

 

“No?” She looks up at him, and she looks more sad than angry.  “We went entire days without talking.  Jim, last year I couldn’t handle not talking to you for three hours during a stupid jinx game.”

 

“Hey, jinx is not stupid,” he says, hoping to lighten the mood.  It’s too serious right now.  He didn’t expect any of this.

 

“Jim,” she says.  It’s clear from her tone that she isn’t in the mood for any jokes.

 

“Look, I’m sorry.  I was… I wasn’t going to come back and have things be exactly the same.  Do you know how hard it was for me to watch you go home with someone else each night?” he asks.

 

“Yeah, I think I have a vague notion,” she says stiffly.

 

Again, a hint.  Why can’t she just say that she feels the same way?  He can’t be sure until she says it.  He seems to be moving the conversation further and further away from such an admission.  Instead he’s just making her angrier.  He sighs.  He can’t seem to say anything right. 

 

“What do you want me to say?  I already said I was sorry.  It’s not like you were the only victim here.”

 

“Victim?  How were you a victim?” Her eyebrows are raised and she looks at him challengingly, and he thinks he really stepped in it this time.

 

“That’s the wrong word,” he acknowledges.  “I just… Pam, I laid myself out there completely.  And you just…” 

 

And then he changes gears, because he just wants to know and he’s sick of explaining himself. 

 

“Why can’t you tell me, even now?  Pam, why can’t you just tell me?  Either way.  I just want to know, whatever the answer is.”

 

She looks at him silently for a moment, and then down at her mug of cocoa.  She seems unable to respond.  So instead she pushes out her chair and stands, and he feels hot white panic leaping in his chest.  She can’t do this to him.  Not again.  Her back is turned to him when he speaks.

 

“Don’t do this again.  Don’t walk away from this,” he says.

 

“Excuse me?” she says incredulously, spinning around to face him.  “You were the one who walked away last time, Jim!”

 

His eyes widen.  He can’t believe that she’s being so difficult right now.

 

“Yeah, after you shot me down!” he almost shouts.

 

“Shot you down?” she repeats, questioningly.  She sighs and sits back down.  “That’s not how I meant it.  In May.  I wasn’t shooting you down.”

 

One delicate finger runs back and forth around the rim of her mug as she composes her next statement.

 

“You’re braver than me, all right?  I get that,” she says quietly.  “But you know me.  You know how hard it is for me to… I don’t do that, I don’t do big declarations.  It was too much all at once.  I couldn’t deal with it then.  I just… I didn’t expect you to leave without saying goodbye as soon as I hesitated.  I’m sorry.  I’m not like you.  You didn’t hesitate.”

 

Hesitated?  Jim never thought of her response on Casino Night as a hesitation.  He finds himself thinking about his own hesitations.  How many times had he almost told her how he felt, but stopped himself?

 

His copout response to “Who Would You Do” in the parking lot during the fire.

 

On Halloween when she told him to take the other job, and all he could say was, “But it’s in Maryland” when he should have added, “And I can’t leave because I’m in love with you.”

 

When they were alone on the roof with his famous grilled cheese sandwiches and when they swayed in the parking lot, sharing his iPod, and he just looked at her but didn’t say what he was feeling.

 

When she was sitting on his bed, in his house, and all he wanted to do was tell her everything and then join her on the bed. 

 

At the Christmas party when he took back the card.

 

On the booze cruise, when he just stood on the deck alone with her, mouth hanging open but unable to say a word.

 

When Michael spilled the beans, and he lied to her and told her that it was nothing, that it was just an old crush.  He took it all back when it would have been so much better to just admit it.

 

When she left him seven voicemails telling him that it was so hard not to see him all day, and he called her back to joke about Todd Packer’s “gift” instead of telling her that every second he spends without her hurts.

 

When Roy told her not to take the internship, and he almost told her exactly how wrong Roy was for her and exactly how right he would be.

 

When he confessed that it was him who complained about her to Toby, but he didn’t tell her why it was so hard for him to hear her make plans for her wedding.

 

He never considered how hard it must have been for Pam to receive the full brunt of three years of hesitations from him, three years pouring out into one grand action in the parking lot on Casino Night.  How he hesitated a hundred times, but didn’t let her hesitate even once.

 

“You’re right.”  It’s all he can say.  He’s stunned by the new view of his own actions.

 

She looks at him, at the cut on his face, and she seems contrite.

 

“I’m sorry.  This whole night is all my fault and I’m sitting here berating you,” she says remorsefully.

 

“Please, don’t,” he says suddenly.  “Don’t blame yourself for him.  You did not do this to my face.”

 

He can’t let her make excuses for Roy.  He doesn’t even want her thinking about him.

 

“Does it still hurt?” she asks gently.

 

“Not too bad,” he lies.  It aches with every word he says.  “Tomorrow it’ll probably hurt more.”

 

She looks back down at her cocoa.  She seems more comfortable speaking to it than to him.  She shakes her head slightly and mutters her next statement so softly he barely hears it.

 

“I can’t believe I chose him over you.”

 

But he does hear it and it makes his heart jump again.

 

“Yeah,” he says, because he can’t think of anything better.

 

She looks up at him, surprised that he heard her.

 

“Look, Pam,” he begins.  “I’ve been an idiot.  I just had to leave.  I couldn’t watch you marry him.”

 

Pam doesn’t speak, but she nods and looks away.  He doesn’t want her to look away.  He needs eye contact right now.

 

So he stands and she looks up, prompted by the sound of his chair scraping backward across the linoleum floor.  Instead of remaining there, however, he pulls the chair next to hers, inches away, directly facing her, and resettles himself.  Their knees are almost touching, and he wants to reach out and hold her hands in his and stare into her eyes, but he settles for laying his palms lightly on her knees.  She’s wearing jeans, so it’s not as though it’s an especially risqué gesture, but it gets her attention nonetheless.  Her eyes dart toward his hands and then back up at his face, shocked by his sudden proximity.

 

“Karen knew that I was just using her.  She said that she was just a buffer, and she was right.  I mean, she’s great.  But she… I was just so afraid of coming back and seeing you every day and not being able to handle it.  I know I’ve been the worst friend.  I just couldn’t act like things were the same as they were a year ago.  I couldn’t go back to being that close to you.  It would have been too hard.”

 

To his surprise she laughs.  It’s a joyless chuckle, one of those frustrated laughs that you let out when you realize that you forgot your wallet when you’re already at the checkout at the grocery store.

 

“We are so bad at this,” she says.

 

He lets out a similar chuckle.

 

“We’re the worst,” he agrees.

 

They look at each other and smile.  They actually smile. 

 

“If there was a Dundie for worst communication between two office workers—” she starts.

 

“Oh, we would win, hands down,” he interjects, and their smiles grow.

 

There is another pause.  He has removed his hands from her knees, but he still feels a little giddy even though nothing has really happened yet.

 

“So…” he starts hesitantly.  “You remember kissing me?  At the Dundies?”

 

She blushes, but she’s still smiling.

 

“I was really drunk, but there are two things that I couldn’t forget from that night if I tried.  The first was kissing you.”

 

“What was the second thing?” he asks.

 

“Dwight leaning over me with his shirt off,” she says, wrinkling her nose in disgust.

 

“Glad I rank up there with Dwight,” he jokes.

 

“Oh yeah.  Kissing you and a shirtless Dwight.  Equally arousing,” she deadpans.

 

“Arousing?” he asks, eyebrows raised.

 

She blushes again.  He smirks and it hurts his cheek.  He winces, but his smirk only grows.  She notices the wince though, and she looks concerned and guilty again.

 

“If it’s any consolation, if your cheek scars, you can tell people that you got into a knife fight in a bar.  Very manly,” she says lightly.

 

He loves her so much.  Loves that she can make him laugh, and make his heart race, and even that she can make it break.  He loves everything about her.  So much that it hurts.

 

“Way ahead of you, Beesley.  I already have a whole story worked out about how I got into a fistfight with a drunken moron over the woman that we both love,” he says.

 

Her eyes quickly widen and then return to normal.  She looks down at her mug again.  Her safe retreat.  He knows exactly what he’s saying.  He knows that he used the present tense.  He did it on purpose.  He’s hoping, praying, that she’ll finally tell him.

 

She’s toying with the edge of her mug again, her eyebrows drawn together as if she’s in deep thought.  She inhales to speak and Jim simultaneously lets out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding.

 

“On Casino Night,” she starts, and Jim feels his heart rate double.  This is really happening.  Finally.

 

“In the parking lot…” she continues.  “I didn’t want to say ‘I can’t.’”

 

She’s looking at him now, and her eyes are glassy with unshed tears.  He wants to ask her what she wanted to say, but he doesn’t want to interrupt for fear that she won’t continue.

 

“And upstairs, when you asked me if I was going to marry him...  I didn’t want to nod,” she continues.

 

She looks away and shakes her head, as if shaking away those memories.

 

“Those were just… weak moments,” she says, and then she sighs like she’s angry with herself and shakes her head again.  “I have a lot of those.”

 

“You are not weak,” Jim says.

 

He reaches out and gives her knee a small squeeze.  She looks up at him again, and purses her lips.  She nods once slightly, and then again more resolutely.

 

“Not anymore,” she says.  And then she gives him a small smile, and he finally feels like it’s okay for him to ask.

 

“Pam, was Roy telling the truth?  Did you tell him that you had feelings for me?” he asks, and he holds his breath waiting for her response.

 

“Yes,” she says directly, and he can exhale.  “Only I was lying a little.”

 

“Oh,” he says, taking his hand off her knee.  

 

He really wishes that she wouldn’t do this to him again.  He can’t take it. 

 

He’s about to say just that when she grabs his hand and pulls it back onto her leg, but higher up, on her lower thigh.  She keeps her own hand over his.  She curls her fingers around so that the pads of her fingertips stroke his palm, and her thumb traces lazy circles on the back of his hand.  He has to consciously focus on not letting his eyes roll back in his head.  How such a simple gesture can have this effect on him, he can’t explain.

 

“Only part of what I told Roy was a lie,” she says. “I didn’t mean to say ‘had.’  I meant ‘has.’”

 

“Oh,” he repeats dumbly, eyes wide.

 

“No more weak moments,” she says, and she gives him another little smile.  She’s being so brave right now, he knows, and he smiles back at her.

 

“No,” he agrees.

 

“Okay,” she says quietly, the smile growing.

 

He wants to kiss her.  He’s pretty sure that she would let him.  He imagines himself leaning forward, her eyelids fluttering shut, his hand sliding the rest of the way up her leg, trailing up and underneath her shirt, resting on her bare back and running up and down the expanse of skin there while his lips move over hers.

 

However, just as he is about to act on these thoughts, when he’s just starting to lean forward, there is a loud pounding at his front door. 

 

His first thought is that it’s Roy, and that he’s come back just to ruin what has to be the most perfect moment in Jim’s life up to this point.  They both look first at the front door and then back at each other. 

 

“Don’t answer it,” Pam whispers urgently.

 

“I won’t,” he says immediately.  He would be crazy to leave this table right now.

 

“POLICE!” a voice calls from the behind the front door.  There is more pounding on the door.  “LACKAWANNA COUNTY SHERIFFS’ DEPARTMENT!  OPEN UP!”

 

Jim looks at Pam.  She looks wearily back at him and nods resignedly.

 

“Perfect,” he says, getting up from his chair.

Her heart is still beating a frantic staccato rhythm against her breastbone.  She trails a few feet behind him, trying to steady her breathing before she has to talk to the police. 

 

She can’t forget the look in his eyes right before the knocking started.  There was something hungry and desperate there.  She could swear that she saw him start to lean forward.  Her eyelids almost flutter shut just thinking about it.

 

However, the spell is broken by the continued banging on the front door.

 

“POLICE!  OPEN UP!”

 

“Yeah, yeah,” Jim mutters under his breath.  His shoulders are tense, the back of his neck stiff.

 

Suddenly a new voice can be heard from the other side of the door.

 

“Jim?!  Jim, are you there?  Let me through!  I know this man!”

 

Jim looks back at Pam with wide, bewildered eyes and raised eyebrows.

 

“No way,” he whispers to her.  He pauses with his fingers curled around the doorknob.

 

“Jim!  If you are gagged and unable to speak, try to knock against a hard surface with the heel of your shoe!  If your legs are tied together and you are bound on the floor, rock your body backward onto your left shoulder and then roll yourself into a wall with as much force as you can!  I will find you, Jim!”

 

Jim pulls the door open and Pam finds herself witness to a strange and hectic combination of confusion, surprise and disbelief.

 

“Dwight?”

 

“Jim!”

 

“Dwight?”

 

“Pam?”

 

Pam blinks a few times, but her eyes are not deceiving her.  Dwight is in fact standing before her looking ready to spring into action.  What type of action he thought would be required in this situation, Pam can’t say, but he’s wearing a tool belt, a canteen, what looks to be his spud gun strapped to his back, and a set of nunchucks slung over his shoulder.  A policeman stands behind him, looking irritated and a little weary, but not surprised.  Pam gets the impression that this isn’t the first time Dwight has come uninvited to the scene of a crime.

 

“I thought you retired from volunteer duty,” Jim says.

 

“Being a volunteer sheriff is a way of life.  I will always be a volunteer sheriff.  It’s not an identity that one can just abandon by returning a uniform and a badge,” Dwight replies importantly.

 

Jim squints at him.

 

“Pretty sure it is though.”

 

“Look,” Dwight starts impatiently.  “I have a Ham radio set up beside my bed.  I keep it set to the police frequency and I heard them send a car to your address.”

 

“You know my address?” Jim asks, frowning.

 

“You sleep with a Ham radio on?” Pam adds, because that strikes her as the weirder detail.  She almost adds, ‘Doesn’t that bother Angela?’ but manages to catch herself in time.

 

“All of that is beside the point!” Dwight exclaims.  He tries to peer over Jim’s shoulder into his living room.  Jim tilts to the left and right, wherever Dwight is trying to look, blocking his view.  “I do not see an emergency here.  Need I remind you, Jim, that calling the police under false pretenses is a crime?”

 

“Did you miss the man passed out on the smashed up car in my driveway?” Jim asks.

 

Cop pushes Dwight aside.

 

“Move it, Schrute.  I need to ask these folks a few questions.  I’m Deputy Thompson.  Are you the woman who called us?  Pam Beesley?”

 

“Um, yes.  Yes, that’s me.”

 

The deputy scribbles something in his notepad. 

 

“The gentleman outside, he’s your ex-boyfriend?”

 

“No.  That’s his brother.”

 

“His brother?”  Officer Thompson points at Jim.

 

“No, my ex-boyfriend’s brother.  My ex drove off.  He was drunk.  I gave the officer I spoke to on the phone his plate number.”

 

More scribbling.

 

“Right.  Okay.  I’m just going to ask you a couple of simple questions, just so we can start a case file.  We’re going to take sleeping beauty back to the station and hold him for disorderly conduct.  You can come down to the station tomorrow if you choose to press any charges against either him or his brother.”

 

“Okay.”

 

Pam fidgets nervously with the edges of her sleeves, tugging them down and grasping at them.  She feels a little overwhelmed.  All this talk of pressing charges and coming “down to the station” is making her realize just how serious everything is.  She feels something brush against her right hand and realizes that it’s Jim.  He laces his fingers through hers and discreetly clasps her hand.  He gives it a squeeze, and she realizes that he sensed her nervousness.  She feels the sudden urge to cry, but pushes it back.  It would be ridiculous to burst into tears now over a simple gesture like this.

 

“Is this your house, Ma’am?” the deputy asks.

 

“No.”

 

“It’s mine,” Jim says.  He sounds so calm and in control.

 

“So whose car is serving as a mattress right now?” the deputy asks.

 

“That’d be mine,” Jim replies.

 

“Okay sir, same goes for you.  You can come down to the station tomorrow, press charges so that your insurance agency will be able to get some reimbursement from them.”

 

Jim nods and Pam knows that he’ll have to press charges now.  It makes her stomach turn a little.  Not that she doesn’t think Jim has the right to make sure Roy pays for the damages.  It’s just the thought of messy courtroom battles that makes her cringe.

 

“Which one did that to you?” Officer Thompson asks, gesturing at Jim’s bandaged cheek.

 

“The ex,” Jim replies without hesitation. 

 

Pam sees Officer Thompson glance down at their clasped hands.  She tugs on her right hand a little, but Jim doesn’t budge.  He won’t hide this.  Thompson nods knowingly.

 

“Mmm-hmm,” he murmurs, and he makes another note in his little book.

 

Jim turns and looks down at Pam.

 

“Look, I can handle this.  Why don’t you go back inside?” he suggests.

 

Before Pam can reply, she feels a hand on her shoulder and realizes that Dwight is guiding her into the house.

 

“I’ll take care of her, Jim,” he says determinedly.

 

Jim looks pleadingly at Pam, and she reluctantly nods, allowing Dwight to steer her the rest of the way through the door.  Jim gives her hand one last squeeze before shutting the door behind them.

 

 

***

 

 

It’s incredibly awkward standing in Jim’s living room with Dwight.  She just keeps staring at all of the trappings he brought.  She’s just noticed that his tool belt includes not one, but two crowbars.

 

“You should sit down,” Dwight says.

 

She almost tells him that she’s fine standing, but sitting seems less awkward, so she tentatively moves to the love seat.  He takes a seat in the armchair directly across from her.

 

It only takes her a second to realize that he’s staring at her.  No, staring is the wrong word.  He’s peering curiously at her, eyes darting here and there with a determined squint.

 

“Dwight, what are you doing?” Pam asks finally.

 

Dwight looks surprised that he’s been caught, as if he was being subtle.

 

“Angela, from accounting, told me what happened at Poor Richards tonight,” he says.

 

“…And?” Pam prompts.  She wants to ask him why Angela would call him so late, but she decides to be nice.

 

“I know that you and Roy had a… verbal dispute,” he says slowly.

 

“Yes.  We did,” Pam replies.  She doesn’t know where this is going.

 

“I would like to conduct a visual inspection,” Dwight says matter-of-factly.

 

Pam frowns.

 

“For what?”

 

“Bruises,” he says.

 

He starts reach for her arm.

 

“No,” Pam says resolutely, pulling her arm pack.

 

“Pamela, you don’t have to hide it.  Not anymore,” Dwight says sincerely.

 

He’s being so earnest that Pam almost feels bad to shut him down.  She opens her mouth to tell him that he doesn’t have to worry, but Dwight holds up one hand and places the other gently on her shoulder.

 

“This is a safe space.  He can’t harm you here.  And if he tries, I will incapacitate him with a series of Goju Ryu Karate moves, and then finish him off with my nunchucks.  If that fails, spud gun.”

 

Pam’s eyebrows fly up so high that she’s worried they’ve left her forehead.

 

“Thanks,” is all she can think to say.

 

Dwight nods, as if to say ‘you're welcome.’

 

“So let’s see, then.  Please roll up your sleeves.”

 

“Dwight, no.  I don’t have any bruises,” Pam says stubbornly.

 

Dwight sighs and looks at Pam like he always does before he’s about to give her a lecture.  Like she’s a confused child.

 

“Pamela, my encounters with Roy have been mundane, but there lurks in every man a feral instinct.  It is our curse.  Good men have learned to quell that instinct with a respect and appreciation for womankind.  But there are some men, weak men, who have not evolved in this way.”

 

“Dwight, Roy has never hit me,” Pam insists.

 

A small voice in the back of her mind adds, ‘but he has left bruises.’  She shushes the voice.  She doesn’t want to remember that.  She doesn’t want to think about the times when Roy would grab her arm or her shoulder with a little too much force.

 

Dwight just continues to stare determinedly at her and she starts to feel bad.  It’s honestly very sweet that he’s worried about her.

 

“Fine,” she sighs. 

 

She rolls up the sleeves of her sweater until they rest above her elbows.

 

“Satisfied?” she asks, showing him her forearms. 

 

Dwight is not satisfied.

 

“A man is much more likely to grab a woman on the upper arms,” he says, and Pam feels a jolt in her stomach, because that is exactly where Roy would sometimes leave bruises.

 

Silently, she pushes the sleeves up even further, almost to her shoulders.  Dwight nods in approval.

 

“Excellent.  Now I just need to check your ribs and back,” he says.

 

Pam gapes at him.

 

“I’m not taking off my shirt, Dwight,” she says firmly.

 

“I assure you that I am a professional,” he says, as if she’s being ridiculous.

 

“A professional pervert?” she asks.

 

“Fine,” he says, sighing theatrically.

 

No one speaks for a moment.  Pam fidgets with her sleeves again before she can work up the courage to ask him what she’s been thinking about since their conversation began.

 

“So… what did Angela tell you?” she asks, trying to sound casual.

 

Dwight presses his lips together and straightens up, all business again.

 

“Just that you and Roy had a lover’s quarrel.  That he became visibly angry and began to shout.  And that immediately after you left he proceeded to destroy most of the glass objects in Poor Richard’s.”

 

Pam nods.  She knows what he shouted, and that everyone there probably heard it.

 

“Did she tell you what he was shouting about?” she asks.  She just wants to know.  Quick like a band-aid.

 

“She might have mentioned something about Jim,” Dwight says hesitantly, trying and failing to look indifferent.

 

“What about him?” Pam asks, no longer pretending that she isn’t flustered.

 

“That he made… unseemly sexual advances,” Dwight says cautiously.

 

Pam feels her stomach flip.

 

“Awesome,” she says under her breath.

 

“You could go to Toby,” Dwight suggests.

 

“What?  Why?”

 

Dwight gives her his lecture face again.

 

“Pam, if Jim is sexually harassing you—”

 

“No!” she cuts him off immediately, eyes wide.  “No, that’s not what happened at all.”

 

He doesn’t continue his lecture.  Instead he just looks at her, waiting for her to continue, to explain what did happen.  She spends a few seconds struggling to come up with a lie, something plausible and mundane.  But then she remembers that Roy and Karen both know anyway and it’s going to get around work no matter what she tells Dwight now.

 

“We kissed,” she says finally.  “Last May.”

 

“But in May you were still with…”

 

“Exactly.”

 

“Oh.”

 

She expects him to say something more.  Maybe condemn her for cheating.  Maybe tell her an old German folktale that relates to her situation.  Something.  But he just sits there, looking contemplative but not shocked or appalled.

 

“It never went any further. Between us,” she reassures him, although he doesn’t make her feel like she has to.  “I told Roy, and he freaked.”

 

“And then he came here,” Dwight says.

 

Pam nods.  Dwight seems to come to some sort of decision.

 

“Some men know how to treat a woman, and some don’t,” he says matter-of-factly.

 

Pam just nods again.

 

“I, for example, worship my girlfriend like the petite goddess she is.”

 

“That’s… good.”

 

“Michael is completely devoted to Jan,” he continues.

 

She can’t help but smile at this.  Despite all of his faults, no one can deny that Michael is a devoted boyfriend.

 

“Yes, he is,” she says.

 

“Jim, for all of his professional and personal inadequacies, does seem to be a sufficient mate for Karen.”

 

Pam blinks, and looks away.

 

“Um… I don’t really…”

 

“They’ve been dating for… it must be at least four months,” he continues.

 

Pam just wishes he would stop.  It’s not her place to tell him anything about Jim and Karen, but she doesn’t like where this conversation is headed.

 

“Yeah, maybe,” she says distantly.

 

“That’s two months longer than my granmutter and granvater dated before they were married.”

 

“Really?  That’s...” She trails off because she’s actually starting to feel sick and she can’t think of anything to say.

 

“Actually, I don’t think Jim has ever had a relationship last that long.  Probably because he’s such a girl.  Karen must be a very special lady.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

She really can’t take this anymore.  It feels like when she has to submit her paintings to an art critique in her class.  The professor and all of the students gather around her artwork and discuss its good points and its faults, and she just has to stand there and pretend like it isn’t killing her to hear it.  They’re just talking about what they see.  It’s not personal.  But it still makes her skin crawl and her stomach churn and she hates every minute of it.

 

Luckily, Dwight seems content to move on to a new subject.  He sighs awkwardly and examines the nozzle on his canteen.  After a moment, he speaks.

 

“So, how many males have you consummated relationships with?”

 

He says it completely casually, as if they’re discussing a late shipment of paper or the weather forecast.

 

“Are you really asking me that?” she asks, dumbfounded.

 

He seems confused by her unease. 

 

“I’ll tell you my answer.  Four.”

 

“You’ve consummated relationships with four males?” Pam asks.

 

“No!  Obviously females,” he sputters.

 

“Obviously,” Pam repeats, smiling a little.

 

“So?” he prompts.

 

Pam shakes her head.

 

“No.  Absolutely not.”

 

Dwight gives her an impatient look.

 

“Pam, it’s the 2000s.  Your number can’t be as high as Meredith’s.  I’m a modern man and I won’t judge you for what fifty years ago would have been deemed ‘promiscuity.’”

 

Pam rolls her eyes.

 

“Jeeze.  Dwight.  One, okay?” she says irritably.

 

“Oh.”

 

His eyes are wide for a second, but he manages to cover the reaction fairly quickly.  They are both silent again for a moment.

 

“It was Roy, right?”

 

“Dwight!” she snaps.

 

He looks sufficiently reprimanded for a second, but he can’t help himself.

 

“So, you’re practically a teenager in the dating world,” he says.

 

She just gives him a seething glare.  She knows he doesn’t mean to make her feel so hopelessly embarrassed, but he’s succeeding nonetheless.  It’s true.  She’s been on only six first dates in her entire life.  There are probably plenty of teenagers who beat her two or three times over.

 

Dwight seems to notice her discomfort.  He clears his throat loudly and straightens up in his seat.

 

“Teenagers have sex in my beet field all the time,” he says, eager to change the subject.

 

“Dwight,” Pam says, disgust showing on her face.

 

Dwight looks immediately remorseful.

 

“I apologize if I’ve crossed the line,” he says.

 

Pam feels guilty for getting so irritated with him.  Really, what has he done tonight but try to help her?

 

“It’s okay,” she says.

She is saved from any further awkwardness by the opening of the front door.  Jim enters, and she notes that he’s alone, no Officer Thompson.

 

“Uh, hey, Pam?  We’re all set,” he says.

 

“Really?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

“Good,” she says.  She lets herself relax finally, just a little.

 

Jim looks at Dwight, waiting for him to say his goodbyes, but Dwight seems clueless.  He’s sharpening the edges of his wire cutters with a Swiss army knife.

 

“So, Dwight, thanks for the backup man, but I think we can handle it from here,” Jim says.

 

Dwight looks up from his task.

 

“Are you sure, Jim?” he asks.

 

“Yes,” Jim says decisively.

 

“Because I can stay the night and guard the front door.”

 

“More than ever, yes, I am sure.”

 

Dwight stands and puts away his tools.

 

“Suit yourself.”  He walks next to Jim at the front door.  “I suggest that you run a trip wire along the base of the front doorway and hook it up to your smoke alarm so that you will be alerted if and when an intruder enters.”

 

Jim nods.

 

“Excellent.  I will not be doing that, but thank you.”

 

“Well then.  Goodbye.”

 

“Goodbye, Dwight.”

 

Dwight is just about to leave, when he seems to think better of it.  He leans in and whispers something to Jim.  Jim’s eyes fly open and he glances back at Pam, but just turns back and nods at Dwight.  Pam frowns as Dwight exits the house.

 

“What was that?” she asks.

 

Jim shakes his head.

 

“That?” he asks.  “Nothing.  Just… Dwight being Dwight.”

 

Jim lets out an exhausted sort of laugh and stretches his arms out above his head.  His shirt rides up just enough for her to get a glimpse of the skin above his jeans before he lets his arms drop back to his sides.  The image reminds her again just how tall and lanky he is.  She averts her eyes, feeling like a teenager trying not to stare at a boy in school.

 

“Are they really gone?” she asks.

 

Jim walks over to the window and peeks out through the blinds.

 

“They’re gone,” he confirms.

 

He turns and smiles at her.  When he starts moving toward the couch, she starts to feel panicked.  Everything that Dwight just said is stuck in her head.  She wonders just how serious Jim’s feelings for Karen were and if she even knows how to date anymore.  All of a sudden she’s realizing that it’s just the two of them, and everything is out in the open, and she doesn’t know if she can do this yet.

 

When he’s about a foot from the couch she stands.

 

“I think I should go,” she says abruptly.

 

His eyebrows draw together and his eyes search her face.

 

“Don’t,” he says quietly.  It’s a plea.

 

She looks at him apologetically.

 

“This night has been so crazy.  We’ve both just come out of relationships in less than pleasant ways.  I mean, you and Karen were dating for a really long time, and I’ve only ever been with Roy.”

 

“Pam—” he interjects, but she keeps right on talking.

 

“I don’t really think that tonight is the best time to start something.”

 

He looks at her with a heartbreaking expression of alarm and desperation.

 

“It’s already started, Pam.  I can’t go back now.”

 

She nods.  She manages to look at him and smile.

 

“I know.  Me neither,” she reassures him.

 

He lets out what she assumes is a sigh of relief and takes a step toward her so that they are mere inches apart.  Before he can lean in, she takes a shaky step backward.

 

“I just need to go home.  I need to think,” she says hurriedly.  She’s already retrieving her coat from the chair that she threw it over.  She hears Jim speak again.

 

“We don’t have to do anything Pam.  We can just sit here and talk.  Or not.  We can just pop in a movie and not say anything.  Or, I think Conan is on.  We could…”

 

He’s panicking.  He thinks that she’s going to undo everything that just happened, walk away.  That’s not what she wants.  It’s just too much to happen all in one night.  They need some time to breathe, both of them.

 

She walks back over to him and looks bravely into his eyes.

 

“Hey, I’m not running away from this.  No more weak moments, remember?” she says, and she smiles.

 

He doesn’t smile back, but he nods.

 

“Yeah.”

 

She makes her way to the door and pauses.

 

“Thanks for everything tonight,” she says.  “I’ll call you tomorrow?”

 

“What?” he says.  He has to think to remember what she just said.  “Oh, yeah.  Definitely.”

 

She smiles once more, and ducks out the door.

 

 

***

 

 

She’s been home for almost a half hour now, and she’s kicking herself.  She left?  Did she really just leave him there?  She knows him.  He’ll be pacing and panicking and reliving each moment in his mind to make sure that he didn’t do anything to offend her. 

 

What was she thinking?  He said they didn’t have to go any further tonight.  She should have taken him at his word.  They could be cuddled up on his couch catching the end of Conan right now.

 

She keeps alternating between worrying about Jim and worrying about Roy. 

 

It’s different with Roy.  She’s more worried about who he might hurt.  He didn’t seem too drunk when he left, but with his hand injured and his emotions running high he certainly isn’t stable.  She’s worried about the possibility of him hurting himself too, if she’s being honest with herself. 

 

She doesn’t know what she’ll do if he hurts himself because she left him again.

 

There’s a sudden pounding on her front door and she feels her heart leap into her throat.  Immediately her pulse sounds magnified in her ears, a muffled drumbeat reaching a swift crescendo.

 

She just knows its Roy.  It must be.  Her hands are shaking and she can’t believe how quickly she’s gone from worried to terrified.  She isn’t afraid that he might hurt her, but the thought of having to deal with him again tonight is too much to bear.  She just wants to ignore him and call the police, but she figures that the he’ll only become more belligerent.

 

She crosses the room with large but wobbly steps and pauses at the door.  The peephole has been cracked since she moved in.  She meant to ask the super to fix it, but it never seemed important enough.  She’s kicking herself now.  She just wants to see how bad he is before she opens the door.

 

But then she decides, screw it.  She’s been braver today than she’s ever been in her entire life.  She refuses to be scared of him.  She’ll just open the door and tell him to go home or she’ll call the police.

 

Without another moment’s hesitation, she yanks the door open, poised and ready with her speech.

 

But it’s not Roy.

 

It’s Jim. 

 

Her mouth is still open and words are coming out of it without her knowing what she’s about to say.

 

“I love you.”

It's out of her mouth before she can even think. It's only then that she really looks at him.  He’s panting a little.  His hair is tousled and his forehead looks a little sweaty.  And then she sees that he has a bike next to him. She starts to ask the obvious.

“Did you ride your b—”

She is cut off by his lips on hers.  She hears his bike clatter to the floor, and her eyes flutter shut, and she can barely register what’s happening.  Then she feels his lips moving against hers and she’s lost.  She brings her arms up around his neck and feels his go around her waist.  He’s practically picking her up, he’s clutching her so close and so tight, but she doesn’t care.  It doesn’t feel like enough contact.  She doesn’t think that too much contact is even possible.

 

She feels him take a step forward, his leg in between hers.  She is forced to take a step backward to keep from toppling over, and he continues this march for another few steps.  She hears a slam and knows that he’s kicked the door shut behind them.  She’s getting lightheaded but she really doesn’t want to pull away.

 

Finally it’s Jim who draws back, but only for a split second.

 

“Car,” he says.

 

She’s about to ask what about his car, when his lips are back on hers.  It’s a quick, frenzied kiss and it ends almost as soon as it began.

 

“Broken,” he says, as soon as his lips leave hers.

 

He hasn’t stopped marching her backward and his lips are on hers again.  She realizes that he’s actually trying to form complete thoughts between kisses.

 

“Couldn’t wait.”

 

Another kiss.  His hands travel down to her lower back.

 

“For cab.”

 

Another kiss.  His fingers tease the waistband of her jeans.  This time when he pulls pack she tries to ask a question.

 

“How did you—” she starts.

 

“Mapquest,” he interrupts, and then he’s kissing her again.

 

Somehow the kisses remain gentle even though his pace is desperate and wild.  He’s tenderly exploring her lips.  Now his fingers are running up her back.  Their lips separate for another moment.

 

“But how did you—” she starts.

 

“Get your address?” he finishes.

 

He’s kissing her again, so she says, “Mmm-hmm,” into his lips.  It causes small vibrations between their lips and the feeling gives her shivers.  His hands are in her hair now, gently massaging the back of her scalp, and they’ve made it all the way past her kitchen.

 

“Called Dwight,” he says when they come up for air again.

 

“What?!” she exclaims, but when they resume their kissing, she forgets about how much gossip that could spark in the office on Monday.

 

They don’t talk again until they’re in front of her bedroom door.

 

Suddenly his hands aren’t cradling her face anymore and he’s pulling away.  She looks at him in a daze, unable to focus on him at first.  He is bracing himself in her doorway, hands on the doorframe, and he suddenly looks hesitant.

 

“Pam, I know you wanted to take things slow.  I’m sorry, I just couldn’t not be with you after everything that we said in my kitchen.  We don’t have to go any further tonight.  I can leave if you want.  Or I can stay but sleep out on the couch.  Or I can sleep in here and keep my hands to myself, I promise.  I just… I don’t want you to feel like you have to do anything you’re not ready for.”

 

She can’t help smiling.  He’s so adorable, standing there, rambling.

 

“Are you really that dense?” she asks.

 

“Nice, Beesley,” he says, half laughing.

 

“Get over here,” she says, taking his hand and pulling him into her room.

 

He moves in again to kiss her again, but she stops him gently.  She looks into his eyes and takes a deep breath.

 

“I love you,” she says.

 

He gets the biggest, goofiest grin on his face and she can’t help but reciprocate. 

 

“I just wanted to reiterate,” she adds. 

 

“I appreciate that,” he says, grinning even more than before.  “Ditto.”

 

“Ditto?” she teases.  “Who are you, Patrick Swayze?”

 

He laughs.

”I love you too,” he says.  “Better?”

 

“Much,” she replies.  She puts her arms around his neck and pulls him close for another kiss.  Just before their lips meet she says, “I was just nervous before.  Sometimes I think too much.”

 

This kiss is much slower than all of the others.  He backs her up until the undersides of her knees hit her mattress.  She lets her legs bend and she falls backwards onto the bed, pulling him with her.  He tugs at the edge of her sweater, and she helps him pull it off.  She thinks it lands on the lamp because the room suddenly looks dimmer.

 

He pulls back and looks down at her and she doesn’t feel the least bit uncomfortable under his gaze. 

 

Until he starts laughing.

 

It’s not raucous laughter, but soft chuckles working their way involuntarily from his mouth.

 

“What?” she asks, crossing her arms over her chest.

 

“Nothing it’s just…” his voice trails off and he gets that goofy smile on his face.

 

“This had better be good,” she says dangerously.  She does not appreciate being laughed at in bed.

 

“Oh, it is,” he assures her.  “Do you remember when Dwight whispered something to me right before he left?”

 

“Yeah,” she says warily.

 

“He told me that I should find a way to get you to take your shirt off for a ‘visual inspection,’” he says.

 

Pam brings her hands up and covers her face.

 

“Oh my god,” she says, and her voice is muffled by her palms.

 

“Yeah.  So… mission accomplished,” Jim says cheerfully.

 

Pam brings her hands down and shoots him a pouting look.

 

“Well, as long as your mission is accomplished, then I guess I can just go do the dishes,” Pam quips, starting to sit up.

 

“Not so fast,” Jim says, trapping her with his arms on either side of her shoulders, leaning down so that his face is only inches from hers.

 

“I’m not done with my inspection,” he says mischievously.

 

He leans in for another kiss and she can’t help smiling against his lips.

Pam rolled over and knocked into something large and heavy.

 

“Ouch,” the large heavy thing muttered.

 

Pam shot up into a sitting position so quickly that her vision swam with tiny black spots for a moment. She blinked several times and saw a hazy, polka-dotted vision of Jim come into focus.

 

“You okay there?” Jim asked.

 

She blinked a few more times until she could see him fully. He was lying under the covers, in her bed, shirtless and, she could assume, pantless as well. His hair was sticking up in various places and he had an adorable, drowsy look on his face. She had trouble breathing for a moment.

 

“Yeah,” she said. Then she plopped herself down so that her elbow was planted on her pillow and her face was propped up on her hand, facing him.

 

“Hi,” she whispered, smiling.

 

He grinned.

 

“Hey,” he whispered back.

 

Just then a wild cougar growled. Well, it sounded like a cougar. It was actually Pam’s stomach.

 

“Hungry, Beesly?” Jim asked, eyes wide.

 

“Apparently,” Pam said, trying hard not to blush.

 

“You sure know how to enhance a romantic moment,” he teased.

 

“This from the man who brought up Dwight Schrute just before we had sex for the first time,” she retorted.

 

“Hey, I didn’t make the same mistake the second time,” he said. He reached out and gently trailed his fingers along the arm that wasn’t supporting her head.

 

“Or the third,” Pam added helpfully.

 

Jim grinned even wider and sat up a little, resting his back against her headboard.

 

“So, what am I going to tell Dwight tomorrow when he asks me if I was able to perform a full inspection?” he asked.

 

Pam joined him in his seated position, pull the sheets up around her like a towel.

 

“You will tell him nothing,” she said firmly.

 

“I don’t know, Pam. Dwight can be very persistent.”

 

“If you tell Dwight that you visually inspected me, I will tell him that you’re going on a camping trip soon and you desperately want to hear everything he knows about bears, but you’re just too proud to ask.”

 

“Okay, that’s not even funny,” Jim said, and Pam giggled. “I would be stuck listening to him for hours.”

 

Pam’s stomach interrupted any further banter with another vicious growl.

 

“Okay, we need to take care of that thing before it attacks us,” Jim joked. He sat up and swung his legs over the side of the bed. As Pam watched him pull on his boxers and trudge toward the doorway, she couldn’t help the ridiculously giddy feeling that rushed through her.

 

When she entered the kitchen, he was already rummaging through her refrigerator.

 

“Just make yourself at home, Halpert,” Pam said, mock-offended.

 

“You will forgive my rudeness when you taste my famous scrambled eggs,” Jim replied, pulling out a carton of eggs and holding them up triumphantly.

 

“Famous scrambled eggs, huh?” Pam asked. “Are they as famous as your grilled cheese sandwich?”

 

Jim opened three cupboards before he found the frying pans. He pulled one out and began his search for the cooking spray.

 

“More famous, in fact. Grilled Cheese is terribly jealous of all the attention Scrambled Eggs gets.”

 

Pam grabbed the cooking spray for him and handed it over to Jim.

 

“Well, that’s too bad,” Pam said solemnly. “But I’ll have you know that my scrambled eggs are quite famous too.”

 

“Really? Is that a challenge Beesly?”

 

“Maybe,” Pam said, trying and failing to hide her smile.

 

Jim pulled out a second frying pan.

 

“Are you prepared to put your money where your mouth is?”

 

Pam grabbed the pan from him.

 

“Bring it,’ she said.

 

They started reaching across each other to get the necessary supplies: eggs, bowls, whisk, etc…

 

“See, this is where that second kitchen would have come in handy,” Jim commented as they bumped hands for the third time.

 

“Well, my stove does have four burners,” Pam informed him.

 

“Four?”

 

Jim looked surprised. He made a big show of counting the burners slowly and carefully.

 

“Wow. That is impressive,” he said.

 

“And your stove has…” Pam prompted.

 

“Only one. Hence my need for multiple kitchens,” Jim said matter-of-factly.

 

They each poured their egg mixtures into their pans and set them on the stove.

 

“That’s funny. I don’t seem to recall a one-burner stove or multiple kitchens from my visit last night,” Pam said innocently.

 

“Oh, yeah. Well, it was my apartment in Stamford.”

 

And just like that Pam felt her stomach sink.

 

“Oh,” she said.

 

She absorbed herself by attacking her eggs with a spatula. A minute passed and Jim could tell that something as wrong.

 

“What?” he asked, confused.

 

“Nothing,” Pam said quickly, still stabbing at her eggs. After a brief pause, she couldn’t help herself. “Did you like it in Stamford?” she asked quietly.

 

“Pam,” Jim said pleadingly.

 

“I’m just wondering,” Pam amended.

 

Jim put down his spatula and looked away, trying to compose his thoughts.

 

“Stamford was… it was just an escape,” he said.

 

Pam took a deep breath.

 

“I missed you so much,” she said. Her voice cracked on the word ‘so.’

 

Jim looked at her with such intensity that she almost looked away.

 

“Me too,” he said softly.

 

To her horror, Pam felt tears forming in her eyes. This time she really did look away.

 

“Pam?”

 

Pam shook her head and didn’t turn around.

 

“Don’t look at me. I’m being that girl,” she said miserably.

 

“What girl?” Jim asked incredulously.

 

“That weird creepy girl who cries the morning after you sleep together for the first time,” Pam said.

 

She felt his hand on her shoulder but concerned herself with stirring her eggs some more instead of looking at him.

 

“That is not weird or creepy,” he said.

 

“Oh, yeah. Totally sexy, I’m sure,” she scoffed. Her eggs were done so she removed the pan from the burner.

 

“Just how I pictured it in my fantasies,” Jim assured her.

 

“Oh really?” Pam said. She was smiling now, finally able to look at him.

 

“Yes,” Jim replied emphatically. Then he tilted his head to the side, and Pam felt weak in the knees. “Well, the reason you were crying in my fantasies was that I was such a sex god you just burst into tears from sheer ecstasy, but…”

 

Pam let out an unexpected laugh. She was still teary, so it sounded ragged and throaty.

”I’m offended by your laughter,” Jim said, feigning insult.

 

Pam stopped laughing and took a shaky breath. Jim seemed to realize that this was important, and the smile fell from his face as well.

 

“I’m not trying to be weird. It’s just… this year has been so hard.” Pam paused for a moment, shaking her head. “The worst. And now it’s over. I’m just so glad that we’re finally here. I didn’t think we’d make it.”

 

A few tears escaped her eyes and trickled down her cheeks. Jim captured her lips suddenly, and Pam let out a little gasp. She found herself pressed up against the counter next to the stove, his hands buried in her hair, and she closed her eyes and pulled him to her tightly.

 

When they separated, Jim rested his forehead on hers and rested his hands gently on her neck just below her ears, cupping her face.

 

“We’re here,” he said quietly.

 

He leaned in for another kiss, but just as his lips met hers Pam blurted out, “Eggs!”

 

“What?” Jim asked, smiling confusedly but not moving away.

 

“Your eggs are burning,” Pam tried again.

 

“Oh shit!” he muttered, whipping around to see his eggs turning brown in the pan. He spun back around and pinned her with an accusatory glare.

 

“Now I get it!” he said. “You were just trying to distract me so that you would win the great Scramble-Off of 2007! Fake crying? Using your feminine wiles? That is just low Beesly.”

 

“Oh yeah,” Pam scoffed. “You caught me.”

 

She was trying desperately not to smile at his pretend outrage.

 

“Yup. Okay. I didn’t want to have to do this,” Jim said gravely as he tossed the eggs in the garbage and put his pan in the sink.

 

“Do what?”

 

“Punish you for your malfeasance,” he said.

 

Before Pam could respond, his arms were around her and he was picking her up. She squealed and laughed as he carried her back to the bedroom. Her eggs grew cold and lay forgotten on the stove.

 

***

 

After making some new eggs, they went to the police station together. Jim didn’t press charges for the assault, just for the car. Pam squeezed his hand tightly the entire time, but didn’t say anything.

 

On Monday Pam drove him to work because his car was still in the shop. Their driving arrangements didn’t escape anyone’s notice. Apparently the gossip mill was been working overtime.

 

Upon entering the office, Dwight handed Jim a form for to fill out regarding the results of the physical inspection on Pam. It was five pages long. Jim filled the entire thing out in great detail.

 

Where it asked, “Were there any strange marks on the body?” he wrote—“Her bellybutton glows in the dark. Is that weird?”

 

This led Dwight to go on a rampage about “falsifying police documents.”

 

Which, of course, led Jim to remind him that it wasn’t a real police document, nor was Dwight a real policeman.

Kelly greeted them with what Jim assured Pam is the new longest word in the English dictionary. Something along the lines of, “OhmygodPamIcan’tbelievethatRoyfreakedoutatPoorRichard’slikethatandthenDwight saidthathetotallyruinedJim’scarandOHMYGODJIMyourcheekisallcutupandyourfaceisonebigbruisedid RoydothatwhenyouwereprotectingPamRyanwouldneverdothatformeOHMYGODOHMYGODareyoutwotogethernow becausethatissooooooromantic!!!!!”

 

Angela just gave them both scathing glares as they took their seats.

 

Kevin mouthed “Nicccce” to Jim whenever he caught his eye.

 

But the worst part by far was finding himself alone in the break room with Karen. He was surprised that she had actually shown up to work.

 

“I like Pam,” she said simply.

 

“Okay,” Jim replied.

 

“Much more than I like you at the moment,” she added.

 

“Right,” Jim said uncomfortably, pretending to examine the candy machine.

 

“And I’m not going to make this awkward for you.”

 

Jim looked at her again.

 

“I’ve already told Toby about us,” she said brusquely. “I haven’t told anyone else. I’m going to talk to Jan tomorrow about promotional opportunities. And transfers.”

 

“Karen—”

 

“Jim, don’t. Please?” Karen stopped him. “Because I’m really trying to take the high road here, but if I hear you say anything approaching the phrase ‘I never meant to hurt you’ or ‘You’re a great person’ I might have to throw something.”

 

Jim nodded.

 

“Okay,” he said.

 

The entire day was strange. He and Pam spent their time trying not to look at each other, trying not to let anything slip. He found himself wishing he could fast-forward a few weeks until everything had settled down with Karen and Roy and everyone at work.

 

At five o’clock he helped Pam slip into her coat. When they walked out of the building he felt her lace her fingers through his.

And they both let themselves exhale.