The warmth of a wrong hand pulls him toward the exit as he struggles to maintain composure. He is on his way to the city where looming building brush against clouds and strangers crash against your shoulder and continue walking like you don’t exist.

He knew he would leave Scranton eventually. It was only a matter of time before his balloon of willingness would rupture with ignominious defeat as his barriers of reality and hopefulness collided.

He tried. He really did. But trying never seemed good enough when it came to Pam, and he had no choice but to swagger forward, looking back only to see if she was looking, too.

And though he never noticed, she was always looking.

Like this moment, for instance. He is holding the door open for his so-called “sweetheart” and can feel the extra weight of this goodbye tugging at his shoulder. He adjusts his messenger bag casually and takes a breath to remind himself that it’s just Pam.

Karen pounces toward the elevator as he takes one look back. His eyes trace along the rigid outlines of his comforting desk, the way the ceiling lights reflect off of Dwight’s pristine desk surface and perspiring forehead, and how the clusters of his co-worker’s desks fit so haphazardly yet are perfect pieces to an inane puzzle.

But mostly, he sees every moment he’s ever shared with Pam as if they were replaying on a broken record in some abandoned uptown theater. He sees her smile in the morning while snowflakes dust her hair and her cheeks scream red from blistering winds. He sees her eyes when she tells him how much she wishes she could follow her “silly dream” of going to art school and how solemn they seemed when tears brushed their crest as she mentioned the damaging name Roy. He sees her face light up when she scurries to his desk to tell him the success of their most recent prank on “Dwigt” and how the corners of her lips curl into the most perfect curve known as her smile.

He glances at Pam, suddenly and without hesitation. She meets his gaze and they share and undeniable moment of truth – that this is what their relationship finally came down to.

He looks back just one last time and suddenly the splinters of the oak door pierce his fingertips as he remembers the way her lips felt like petals against his yearning lips. The floor seems to fold under his weakening knees as he recalls how gorgeous she looked in the moonlight and how her fingers sent shivers from head to toe. He forgets to breathe as he realizes leaving isn't always the right choice.

If he leaves this time, there won’t be any turning back. The city is waiting. Pam isn’t. That’s how their relationship would stand – forever stuck in a crevice so deep it would hurt them both if either of them decided it was wrong.

He presses his damp lashes together and tugs the door closed. “Crap,” he thinks as Karen’s eyes glisten from the elevator.

He pauses for just a moment and thinks about his fingers tracing along the chrome handle and if he should turn back.

But he can’t do that now. He’s gone too far already.

It’s been goodbye.

He plops into the front seat of his car as his eyes climb the walls of the Dunder Mifflin building, searching for a girl with bouncy, red curly hair looking out a window with the same frown and a dream for more in her eyes.

He’s afraid something will slip past his lips on their way to New York. But he’ll choke back his urge to fight and smile because he knows Karen hates it when he looks vulnerable.

Jim’s always listened to all types of stories about love. They were always about how happy his friends were and how great their lives were because of love. But he never understood why love was so perfect for everyone else when all it did for him was suffocate his dreams.

He wraps his hand around Karen’s more tightly as he tries to convince himself that this is right. Their arms awkwardly hover over the cup holders situated between them in the console of Jim’ car and Karen sighs because she hates how they can’t be “natural.” She looks up at him, her eyes dripping with hope and his stomach twists as his lips purse and he forces himself to smile.

“Aren’t you excited? I mean, this is it, Jim.” Karen says, her words almost a whisper but pinched with faux confidence.

“If ‘this is it’ then I should be smiling,” Jim thinks. He quickly erases the thought and responds, “Yeah, of course I’m excited.” He shows off a big grin and Karen mimics it, almost hinting to the fact that she understands his unwillingness to march forward.

“We both need to get out of Scranton and just move on with our lives. It isn’t fair to me or you to keep things the way they were.”

“Yeah, I totally agree.”

Jim shuts his mouth – how many times have they had this conversation? He can think of at least four times when she’s chewed him out. There was that one time at the Starbucks across from Chili’s when their barista’s name just happened to be Pam – Karen ranted for eight minutes about how he “shouldn’t have looked at her that way” or been “so sweet to her.” Or that other time when Jim mentioned a joke he and Pam played on Dwight and how fantastic that day at work does – Karen couldn’t help but ask why their work days “weren’t ever fun” or why he “just stop hanging out with her so much.”

Karen continues on for the entire trip with useless information about her newly engaged long lost friend, how she almost spilled her coffee on her pajamas last night, and how thrilled she is to meet some authentic “New Yorkas.”

Jim stares through the windshield, thinking about how wrong this feels and how perfect it should be. He’s driving with a beautiful young woman who he has the liberty to call his girlfriend to the Big Apple to interview for a position high up in the corporate offices of Dunder Mifflin. He has a great group of friends, including one who he feels way more attached to than normal, but that’s okay because the more he tells himself to move on, the better he will feel about living his soon-to-be perfect life.

It has been four years since he’s seen another girl and gotten butterflies. It has been two months since he’s gotten goose-bumps strayed across his arms. But it has only been moments since the last time he felt the all too common pinch in his throat and the tug at his heart when Pam looked into his eyes.

He yanks the wheel to glide into a rare parking spot a few blocks down from the Dunder Mifflin offices. They step out and begin to walk down a gray frosted street accented with brick apartments and the occasional makeshift tree surrounded by a plastic black fence. Litter is strewn about the sidewalk but he thinks of it as decoration, just like lampposts in Scranton were adorned with scrolls showing local hot spots and dine-ins. The “New Yorkas” pace by with cold eyes and hands in their pockets, their attention purposely drawn away from the business-like couple struggling to find their sense of direction.

Buildings around him collide with the sky and act as a barrier to the life in Scranton he knew he was leaving behind. The girl hugged close against his shoulder as they pace toward the headquarters of their future symbolizes a new beginning that he cannot bring himself to take. And the hiding tears in his sorrowful eyes are silent reminders of why he has to do this.

They arrive at the front doors of the intimidating building and he reaches for the handle very slowly.

“Come on! Let’s do this!” Karen shrieked ecstatically, her hands forming small fists and reaching at the sky as if she were cheering him on.

He smiles halfheartedly, allows her to step forward, and glances toward the sun and prays for something better than what he had to leave behind.