ONE:

She feels like it’s a sign. Like it’s some kind of signaling of the apocalypse or something, because really? It’s so goddamn pitiful, crumbled around bubble wrap at the bottom of a box labeled “Kitchenware”, and it basically just sucks. It was like her last real tangible memory of him, really, and it just sits there in millions of tiny, jagged pieces.

And it’s so typical that this would happen, just when she’s getting her life together after he shattered it. She’s seriously so over it because she was moving in to her new apartment with it’s soon-to-be creamy walls of ivory and eggshell—blank slates she could fill with watercolors and oil paintings (some hers, some not). And now her light wood floors are dusty with terra-cotta after she tried to salvage some of it, any of it from that goddamn box of “Kitchenware”. Sea foam and meaningful, crumbled around bubble wrap that she’d so cautiously stuffed in the belly of the pot, in the stem, lid taped carefully with her thumb and forefinger two nights before.

Really, it’s just so typical.

So she goes to Crate & Barrel that weekend and buys your standard teapot, white and looping and on sale for $19.95. There. Done. And when she brings it to work, it takes a while before she recognizes it as hers. For the first few weeks, when she walks into the kitchen she’ll look around and the kitchen is just really pale without her little teapot (like him, it sort of brightened up the gray of Dunder Mifflin Scranton). But anyway she'll whip her head around a few times and have an awful image of Dwight or Toby or someone using her teapot, but then she see the stark white reminder of newness and blank slate and goes over with her decaffeinated white tea and boils the water and rummages through the drawers in the kitchen for a packet of Sugar in the Raw.

-------------------------

He realizes it within his first week back from Stamford. And she’s sure he thinks she’s like, being cruel and throwing it in his face that she’s “moved on” or something. Well to be perfectly honest, she hasn’t moved on but she trying, so. But she really just wants him to ask about it, just say something maybe a little accusatory, so she can respond with like, ‘Well actually, it broke when I moved into my new apartment that I bought when I broke up with Roy because I’m in love with you.”

But he’s Jim, so let’s get serious. They’re both in the kitchen and she’s boiling water and he’s sipping coffee with tons of milk and sugar (“evolved” her ass) when it happens. He asks quietly in this gravelly voice that’s like, wow, and she shivers despite the fact that she’s pouring boiling water into her mug. Soft and questioning because of course he’s Jim, he’s staring down into his coffee and just goes,

“New teapot?”

She grimaces as she turns toward him.

“It broke, the old one,” she says, matter-of-fact, “When I moved.”

“Oh.” he stares into his mug and she looks up as his eyebrows spring back to emotionless-ness, but she’s sure she saw that pained look, tortured expression. The little fucker.

“Yeah. This one’s a little bigger though, more efficient,” and she knows he can hear the cruel edge in her voice, “so I guess maybe I’m evolving too.”

TWO:

Pam wakes up to a loud splintering crash. She springs up in bed and scrambles to get out, one leg getting tangled in her purple sheets before she shoves a sweatshirt from the dresser down over her head.

Exasperated groans travel down the hall and for a second she’s worried, but then a loud string of expletives follows. Instead she rolls her eyes, her bare feet thump softly against the floor as she pads to the kitchen.

“Roy? What hap--Ouch!” she cries, and hops on one foot as she searches the floor for her wound-inflicting adversary. The sharp, jagged edges of the shard contrast with the smooth turquoise surface, embedded in the white shaggy throw rug. It takes her a second to realize what it is, and when she does her throat constricts and her stomach drops. She feels dizzy: teapot teapot teapot.

“Pam?” a gruff voice calls from the behind her. She hears the thump of heavy work boots, unfamiliar against the wood floors of her tiny apartment. “Pam? Don’t go in there; I broke your goddamn tea thing.” Roy lumbers past her into the kitchen, carrying a broom and dustpan.

“I alrea—what happened?” she stammers, leaning against the doorframe. She lifts her injured foot; the initial stinging is now just a dull ache on her sole.

“I was gonna make you some tea, but I stubbed my toe on the stupid kitchen table, which hurt like a bitch by the way, and I dropped your goddamn tea thing.” he says gruffly, frustrated.

“Oh, are you okay?” she asks, still inspecting her foot for any damage.

He mumbles a “fine” and waves her off, bends down to start sweeping the pieces of terra cotta scattered throughout the kitchen. At one point he slides under the table to get a particularly large piece, bumps his head on the table as he's standing up. Another string of expletives follows, but he doesn’t want any ice when she asks, just rubs the back of his head for a second.

“Pammy—er, Pam? Don’t you think this table’s kinda big for the kitchen? Like this kitchen is real small compared to our old kitchen and I know you wanted our old table and everything, but…” he stands and moves to find the trash can. She feels a tiny bit of satisfaction in her chest when he checks two cabinets before locating the correct one. As his back is turned, she bends down to grab the piece she stepped on, pockets it.

“I like this table.” she says, tone dry. She feels kind of bad since its injured him and everything, but he broke her teapot, so.

“Whatever. You still want some tea?”

“It’s fine. Thanks for the thought, though.” she kind of wants him to leave, wants him to offer to at least buy her a new teapot.

“Yeah, well, I’m trying, right? Boyfriend-girlfriend stuff. Making you tea.” he grins, a little self-righteously. “You know what, I’ll put a mug in the microwave instead. Go back up to bed.” he pecks her on the cheek, dry and chaste.

Pam’s petty sure she already said no, and she hates tea in the microwave, but he’s trying, so she complies, does what he says. Seven minutes later he comes in with a mug, slipping under the covers next to her.

“Here you go. Chamomile’s your favorite, I remember.” He pronounces chamomile like the ‘ch’ in chocolate.

“Yeah, it is.” she lies, forcing a smile because he’s trying.

She takes a sip and it’s too weak and too sweet but she drinks it anyway; her foot hurts.

THREE:

They come back from dinner (Olive Garden) and drinks (Cooper’s) around 11:30, both too giddy and way too tipsy to let him go home. She invites him in after a prolonged kiss outside her doorstep (soft, electric, too short). She wants to run her tongue along his teeth, wants to feel more than his bottom lip between hers. So he comes inside and they drift to her kitchen, she asks if he wants any tea, maybe cinnamon toast?

He says “yes” but the last thing on his mind is bantering over a midnight snack. But she’s standing there in her pink skirt with her pink cheeks and pink lips and pink tongue and it makes him agreeable to anything she asks. And so she opens the cabinet and reaches up for her teapot, the teapot he gave her, before she was his. For some reason that makes him quiver and need her even more; he can’t help but press up against her back, whisper her name like a question against her neck, feel her shiver and sigh before he places his tongue against the spot where her shoulder meets her neck.

She whimpers and sets the teapot down before turning around in his arms, eyes wide and dark, lips parted. She tilts her chin up and runs her hands against the front of his light blue button up shirt, no tie, sleeves rolled to his elbows.

All it takes is her soft plea, “Jim,” before he has the top of her ass digging into the counter and her head pressed against the cabinet door. When his tongue slip-slides, parts her swollen lips she moans, her arms wrap around his neck and pull him down closer to her. He tilts his head and is kissing her and oh. He grips her waist and lifts her easily onto the counter, moving between her legs and pressing, she needs him even closer, she needs him like now, more, yes. They both moan as her hands drift down his back, down over his belt, way down, pressing his pelvis more solidly against her. Bright white flashes behind her eyelids as she feels him between her thighs; her skirt rides up, pressing him hard against her. When his lips leave hers and travel down the column of her throat, she groans, wraps her legs around his waist, his name and expletives and wholehearted affirmations falling from her mouth.

He picks her up in this (manly) crazed flurry, eyes clouding and lust pumping, and his arm knocks against something. It teeters warningly and both of their eyes spring open just as a loud smash resounds throughout her kitchen, turquoise clay lying in ruins by their shoes. Pam just stares down in shock, still reeling from the intenseness of the previous situation, kicks a good sized chunk of the stem close to her foot into the sandy pile. She realizes that this dumb pot just shattered what was definitely about to happen, but she thinks maybe it also shattered what’s already happened, too.

Wordlessly, Jim sets Pam gingerly back on the counter to avoid the sharp fragments that litter her kitchen floor.

He runs a hand through his hair and heaves out a long shaky breath, closes his eyes and shakes his head.

“I’m seriously so sorry, Pam, really,” jerking her from her trance. She lifts her gaze to him, shrugs. Honestly, she’d really just like to get back to the making out or whatever they were doing (making up for lost time fits too). Pam’s heartbeat is still thumping rapidly, but she’d like to chalk it back up to erratic, please.

She takes a few calming breaths, leaning her head back against the cabinet.

“Don’t even worry about it,” she assures him, opening an eye, reaching out to slide her fingers beneath his rolled sleeves, over his forearms. “Let’s just sweep it up real quick and get back to—,” she cuts off abruptly and gulps, blushes.

Jim chuckles and the apples of his cheeks get a little pinker, too. He grins (kind of wickedly, which is hot) at her, says, “Yeah, okay,” as his fingertips drift over her thighs. She directs him toward the dustpan and broom underneath the sink and he quickly sweeps the shards off the floor, leaves the pan (doesn’t bother throwing away the remnants) on her counter before carrying her down the hall and finishing what they started in the hallway, the yellow rug at the foot of her bed. After they come down from their delirium he promises to take her to buy her a new teapot that weekend. She kissed his knuckles, his chest, his lips, and exhales “Yeah, okay.”

He leaves the next morning after breakfast (cinnamon-sugar toast) and sex on her kitchen table (next to half-eaten cinnamon-sugar toast), and after he leaves she dumps the old, shattered pot into the trash can.