“Well, I’m evolving Pam.”

You know that he was only joking, in response to your remark on change, but you notice every day how much things had evolved in both of your lives.

It went beyond the exchange of water for grape soda, or substituting his ham and cheese sandwich for a new choice every day. He had picked up the pieces of his heart that you didn’t intend to break, and he had placed them back together and moved on.

The two of you had been the fish swimming together in the water, in perfect rhythm, side by side, but he was evolving.

He was growing legs, lungs, and was beginning to breathe the fresh air, while you remained completely submerged, looking up through the murky water at his tall frame.

He was learning to walk upright, stand on his own, and you were still in the water, scraping the bottom of the sea.

You told yourself that you could evolve yourself, but your leaps out of the water were just that, leaps. You arched into the air and fell back again into the same sea, just a few meaningless feet away from where you started.

“There are other fish in the sea.” The words echo in your head, but you know that you are stubborn, and you don’t want any fish. You want Jim, even though you already caught him, and threw him back in.

These thoughts haunted you as you fought to gain control of your life. You watched him continue to walk away from the sea, fading farther away from you, as you set up your home again as best as you could with him gone.

"I'm evolving", you told yourself. But you were still miles behind him. You should have never let Roy come back in your life, but you did, and you are at least happy that led to your choice to keep him out forever.

It wasn’t long after that when you began to notice them. The tiny flaws in his evolutionary chart. The small regressions he was beginning to make.

You found the time you spent staring at the back of his neck was being replaced with full on swivels of his chair, and a large smile in your direction.

He wasn’t drinking grape soda anymore, but you saw him sneak cokes out of the vending machine, his water bottles left untouched, flashing you a quick smirk when he left the kitchen.

When he began to get restless during the day, he came to you again, and you slowly regained your expertise in being his partner in crime.

It was the flaws in evolution that really mattered. Those flaws created the anomalies, the loch ness monsters, the things people really talked about. The smallest cracks in the evolutionary chart made the largest difference, and you noticed every one.

He was at your desk now, fully leaning in to speak, the awkward barrier between you wearing down more every day.

He is still walking, but it seems that every day he takes another step in your direction, back towards the sea. You want him to submerge himself again, but you know he has to test the waters first.

He makes you laugh, loudly, and you notice out of the corner of your eye that Karen is staring at the two of you, noticing his regression as well.

You continue talking to him, making him snort slightly as you he joins you in laughter. You can still see her out of the corner of your eye, and you know you are childishly making her jealous, but you will never evolve out of that.

You believe in divine creation anyways.

“I’ve evolved Karen, I’m a different person.”

He said as the two of you ‘talked it out.’

You forced him to try the grown-up approach to handle the situation you were faced with. You wanted to save the relationship. But at 3 am he wanted to sleep, and was tired of answering your questions.

You talk to him while he’s half asleep, pester him to work when he is awake, but you still find him over at the reception desk, his back turned to you, laughing at every word that she says.

You came to Scranton because of him. You hate to admit it to yourself, because you always prided yourself in being above that, in being a career minded woman. You faltered in climbing your ladders that day, and now you want to take them two at a time.

When you met Jim at Stamford, he wore a full suit, jacket and all. He was newly promoted, fun to talk to, and a relief to you from the uptight surroundings of the branch.

Even if the Jim Halpert you met at Stamford was a fine form of evolution, he had reached his peak while he was there, and had begun to move down in the other direction.

It was a progressive decline, but you noticed every step.

You had thought that you were both together once, walking in perfect step, climbing every ladder that you came across, nothing but success ahead of you both.

But you see now what you couldn’t see before. That while you were walking confidently, Jim was struggling to put one foot in front of the other. You were accustomed to breathing, and Jim wasn’t used to the fresh air.

He had been submerged for years, while you had been running circles around the sea.

While you climbed the ladders, he was only looking down.

“Why don’t you go out there and sell some paper so we can take a trip?”

You had given him so much time to adjust, given him the benefit of the doubt, but you see now that you have to push him to continue walking, because that’s the only way the two of you can survive.

You saw him falter with his breaths, and you made sure he kept up the normal rhythm. He tripped with his steps, but you did your best to make sure he walked in a forward direction, and that he recovered quickly.

But he’s fallen too far behind you. You stand at the base of so many ladders waiting for him to join you there, but he keeps taking one step forward, then three steps back towards the shore.

You stare at him now, and as he laughs Pam turns to meet your eyes. She doesn’t hold your gaze long, and turns back to look at him to continue the conversation, as they both fall into another fit of laughter.

You begin to get up, to walk over to remind him of the ladders he has to climb. To remind him that he is wasting his time looking down into the sea.

Your phone rings, catching you, and you freeze for a moment thinking of the decision that has been in front of you for months. You pick up the receiver and turn towards the ladders once again. As you speak to your client you take your own steps, quickening your pace. It hurts you to leave him behind, but you can no longer carry his burden.

Jim has turned his dreams in a different direction, and you can no longer carry him down the entire path. Only the strong advance to where they want to go, and your dreams are still in front of you, so you choose to leave him behind.

You don't look forward to the break up, but you know that only the strong survive, and you have too many ladders waiting in front of you to take the time to fish him out of the sea.