Jim Halpert had everything a young man could wish for: money, nice suits, a great loft in New York City, a lot of women lining up to date him. He was envied by a lot of people. His family was proud of him. He had made it big time. But still, he was unhappy. There was something missing from his life, like he had nothing that really mattered to him. He was also very lonely.

His so called friends were all assholes, and most of the women he had met were shallow and sadly empty. Just like he was. He didn't even remember how to actually being in love with someone felt like.

His last girlfriend, Annabelle, cheated on him with one of his colleagues. That day was impressed in his mind, because it was probably what most people would call “hitting the bottom”. Or at least, the beginning of a very slow descend into misery and self pity.

It happened six months ago. He had decided to get home early, pulling some strings and calling in some favors to have Adam cover for him. It wasn't easy, cause Adam was annoying and arrogant and, well, just a huge piece of shit. But he wanted to surprise Annabelle by cooking her dinner, cause he never did things like that anymore, not like when he was a dumb, romantic college kid. He just felt this impulse to do something, to make an effort for once. He didn't want this relationship to just fade away and slowly die like every other one he had had so far. And it wasn't because he had particularly deep feelings for her. He just wanted this to last because at least it was better than being alone again. It was just...a better option. It looked like what a normal 30 years old guy should do. And maybe he would eventually get used to it and pretend he was actually happily in love. A pretty wife was maybe the only thing missing from this ridiculous plastic life he was living. What harm could a little bit more of pretending actually do? It was all he did all the time anyway.

So that evening he went grocery shopping, he picked up wine and even candles. The cashier smiled at him while he was in line, cause apparently he looked like a really good boyfriend. He smiled back feeling like a complete fraud. He walked in his apartment with a lot of bag in his hands, pushing the door open with his shoulder. The moment he got inside, the bags immediately fell down from his hands. There was Annabelle, naked, on top of a just as much naked Alex.

“What the fuck is happening?” is what Jim said. It was a pretty ridicolous question cause there was no misunderstanding what was happening there, no matter how much she tried to convince him it was “not like it looked”. The whole being naked thing wasn't really helping her cause, and she was being very pathetic in that moment.

The weirdest thing of all was that Jim didn't feel any pain. He felt relieved. She had just offered him a way out without him having to make any actual decision.

Looking at Annabelle crying and trying to explain while Alex ran out of the door half naked, he had only one simple, reasonable question in his mind, and he actually started laughing hysterically: “Why the fuck would you do this in my apartment?” Apparently, it was “more dangerous”. To this day Jim couldn't understand how could have she been so stupid. He really dodged a bullet.

That was the night the drinking started. He was so disgusted by Annabelle, by Alex and most of all by his own lack of emotional reactions that he decided passing out on the couch was actually better than facing himself and trying to understand what the hell was wrong with him, cause clearly, something must have been wrong. He was clearly broken.

How did he end up like that? In the following months he asked himself this same question over and over, between a sip of Whiskey and a beer. He never managed to find a satisfying answer.

He was so hopeful when he moved to New York, back when he was just a bit more than a kid. He remembered it like it was yesterday, applying for a job at a record label, just an intern job, nothing fancy, but it seemed like a cool idea to work with artists. He had no expectation to actually get the job, but against all odds he got the call while he was going to an interview for a job in some lame little paper company.

He was already in the parking lot, looking at the very depressive office building, thinking about how horrible it would actually be to work in there. He saw a bunch of people passing by his car. There was this guy, dressed in a suit, not very tall, acting like he was telling the funniest joke in the world. Next to him there was a weird tall guy with a mustard shirt and glasses who laughed at everything the man said, while a black guy rolled his eyes and looked completely done with the entire world. That did not look like a happy place to work. Right when he was opening his car door to get out, his phone rang.

“Mr Halpert?”

“Yes, it's me.”

“I'm Jodie, I am calling about your job application.”

He almost didn't let her finish. He immediately turned the car around, almost running over a tiny blond woman who almost killed him with a look.

He got home packed a bag and started looking for apartments.

Two days after, he officially moved to New York. His apartment was really small and his roommate was a nightmare, constantly complaining about Jim's mess, but he felt happy and truly lucky. He was in New York! He had left Scranton! He was working in the music industry! It was like all his dreams were suddenly becoming true.

The first year was was incredible. He was overwhelmed by the city. He met so many different people and he made so many new experiences and saw things he could have only imagine back in such a little town like the one he grew up in. Museums, theaters, the best restaurants, concerts. It was all so perfect in the eyes of a 22 years old kid from a small town.

But now things were so different. He was 30 and growing tired of the chaos of the city. His work wasn't funny anymore. He was a big shot in the label, which meant mostly bureaucracy and meetings with annoying managers and terrible publicists for shitty bands. He never met any actual musician anymore, only the big shots who were mostly spoiled brats once you got over the excitement to meet them. He had completely lost his passion.

He didn't know who the fuck he was anymore. He missed the goofy, funny, positive guy he used to be. Now he was an empty ghost in an expensive suit. His life was slipping away from him.
Sitting in his apartment, the fourth drink of the night in his hands, he wondered what would have had happened to him if the phone call never came. If he had stayed in Scranton. Would he have been happier? Or would he have been a sad, terrible person all the same?

He drank. And then drank again. Alcohol was becoming a problem lately, and he was scared of himself, even if he didn't want to admit it. He didn't want to go down that path. He felt like such a cliche.

The phone rang. It took Jim a couple of minutes to find it.

“Hello?”

“Where the fuck are you, Halpert?” It was Frank, his boss. And he did not sound happy.

“What? I'm...I'm...home. Why?” Jim wasn't really sure if he was awake or just dreaming this.

“We had a meeting with that shitty indie band manager! You are almost an hour late!”

“Shit. Shit! I'm coming. I'll be right there.” Jim had completely forgotten about the meeting. It was a pretty important one and there were a lot of money at stake here.

He could barely stand up straight, the room was spinning around him and the simple task of getting dressed seemed like climbing a mountain. A really big one. He didn't even tried to put is tie on.

He almost got run over while trying to stop a cab.

“Get out of the way! Are you insane?”

“I...stop. I need a cab. Can you take me please?” He was sweating a lot, he could feel it all over his blue shirts. Not a good color idea.

“No way, you are drunk!”

“I'll give you 200 bucks.”

“Ok, but do not puke in my cab!”

He had no idea where the meeting was, and that it took him three attempts to finally find Frank's number on his phone, cause he kept messing up with his touchscreen and he actually started shouting at “these stupid modern phones” before finally finding the number and getting the adress. At least he managed to not get sick in the backseat.

He got inside the restaurant looking homeless. Frank walked toward him like he was ready to murder him on the spot, without caring about witnesses.

“Are you fucking drunk? You've got to be kidding me!” He was exasperated and a more than a bit scary.

“What? Me? No! I am fine. I am fine. Just...I had one drink but I am fine.” Jim was convinced he sounded absolutely believable. In fact, he was slumbering his speech pretty bad.

“You piece of shit, you are gonna cost me a lot of money. Do not ruin this or you are done.” Frank's face was so red Jim got worried he was gonna have an heart attack. Would that be considered his fault, technically? His head was hurting so bad with all this thinking!

Their potential client, tired of waiting for the two idiots arguing at the front door, decided to get a closer look at what was going on, so he walked up to them.

“Is everything ok Mr Daniels?” He asked to a flustered Frank.

Jim immediately jumped in and shook the client's hand. The client did not look happy for all the sweating.

“Everything is perfect, Mr...Mr...” He could not remember this guy's name at all. B...B something. Berger? Basket?

“Bennett. We talked on the phone.” He sounded very, very annoyed and ready to get the hell out of there.

“Bennett, sure, of course! I'm Jim Halpert, I am gonna be taking care of...” The running down the stairs, the cab drive, the hot and claustrophobic restaurant were too much for Jim to handle, he just couldn't help himself anymore. He felt it immediately, the taste in his mouth. He knew it was coming but there was nothing he could do to stop it. It was all too much. He ended up throwing up on his client's very expensive shoes.

“You are fucking fired Halpert, you hear me? You are gone!” Those words screamed at him by Frank where the last thing Jim would remember about that night.

Like every single day, Pam was sitting at her desk, bored to death. She was doodling something on her notepad, checking her clock every few seconds, pushing the minutes till she could finally get the hell out of that office and put on some pajamas. Just ten more minutes.

She hated her job. It was so pointless and insignificant. Being a receptionist wasn't exactly the most compelling and gratifying job in the world, but having to do that in a place like Dunder Mifflin Scranton? That was an absolute nightmare. She basically had to babysit her boss and listen to her coworkers complaining all day. She had no real friend in there. No one really talked to her, they barely glanced at her in the morning when they came in. There was not one single thing in her workplace that could make her excited to get up in the morning.

When she started working in that crazy place, she took comfort in the fact that it was all supposed to be just temporary. Roy and her had just got engaged and she needed money for the wedding, so the moment he hear the receptionist from his place of work had left, he immediately asked Michael to consider Pam for the job.

“It's gonna be awesome babe, we are gonna work in the same building!”

“Yeah. That is gonna be great. I am just a bit worried about the five receptionists leaving this job in the past 2 years...”

The moment she took her first step in that office, she immediately knew why every single girl had ran away. Still, she was still there, almost six years later. She managed to resist. It should have been just a couple of years, until they were settled and she could have started art classes and moved on to a better job while Roy would have probably been promoted to head or the whole warehouse. It sounded like a solid plan.

Things didn't exactly go that way, obviously. She was still sitting at the same damn desk. She didn't go to art school. Roy pointed out to her that it was insane to spend so much for “just an hobby” that was “clearly not going anywhere” and that she should have kept her safe, steady job because “it was not like she could hope for something that much better.” So she believed him. She stopped hoping. She stopped dreaming. There was no house with a terrace. There was no becoming a children's book illustrator. There was no moving to a big city full of arts. There was only real life, and she really hadn't anything to complain about. She had a husband, a job, a house. Wasn't that all she needed? Then why was she always so...unsatisfied? What was wrong with her?

She looked at her wedding picture. The woman staring back at her didn't look much happier. Her smile seemed forced. She remembered how she had felt for the whole day: like she had a brick in her stomach. Probably that was normal, being nervous the day of your wedding. But what if it wasn't?

She couldn't believe that the love they talked about in songs could be just that: long silences, constant fighting, that sense of boredom and predictability. That deep loneliness. But how was she supposed to know for sure?

She had met Roy when she was just 15. He was the school team's quarterback, he was popular and handsome and older. He was completely out of her league. She never even considered the idea that he could like someone like her, and honestly, she thought he was kind of an idiot. When he asked her to the dance, she almost said no, but Isabelle pushed her elbow into her side so violently she thought she was gonna make a hole in there, so she ended up saying yes more to make her happy than for herself. Her plan was to go to the dance with him and then tell him she was not interested, but plans never really worked out the way Pam imagined them. That night, Roy was actually really nice to her, he wasn't anything like she was expecting. He was cute and he made her laugh. She let him kiss her when he brought her home. The next Saturday they went to a Hockey game for their first official date, and from that moment they had never really been apart. He was the only man she had ever been with.

Sometimes she just wondered if she was missing something, but all these though accomplished nothing but to make her feel guilty. She didn't want to be like this. She wanted to be a good wife. She wanted to make Roy happy. He wasn't a bad man, after all. He had his flaws, obviously, but who didn't? She knew way too well that she wasn't perfect either. Maybe that was love, being together to share their imperfections. That sounded poetic enough, like something from a Valentine's Day card, so maybe she could just believe it.

“Hey Pammy, are you done yet?” Her husband materialized at her desk and she jumped, scared and guilty like she thought he could read her mind.

“You scared me! I didn't see you come in.” She started playing with her necklace, moving her fingers around the little golden chain, like she needed a way to keep her hands busy.

“Always with your head up in the clouds, right? You should pay more attention, what if I was a costumer?”

She forced a smile. She hated when he talked to her like she was a child, but she was in no mood to fight.

“I'm sorry, you're right. Just five more minutes, I'm waiting for a fax. You can wait in the car if you want.”

“Cool. Hurry up, I have to go out with the guys in an hour.”

“Are you not eating home? I was gonna cook...” He didn't even let her finish. She hated that as well.

“Don't start with the guilt trip. I worked my ass off all day, I deserve to have some fun with my friends”

“Yeah, sure, of course.” She couldn't really deny that to him, could she? “I'd have some lasagna waiting for you in case you are hungry when you get home.”

“Thanks, you're the best. Now please, hurry up, cause if you're not down in five minutes I'll leave you here.” There was a second of silence. Pam was looking at him with a stunned expression until he smiled at her. “Just kidding! You should have seen your face! But really, move please.” And as fast as he'd appeared, he was gone. She was pretty sure it wasn't normal that for a moment she totally believed he was just gonna leave her at the office.

Jane, the sales woman sitting at the desk in front of her, gave Roy an appreciative look. Pam was used to it, but she never found the courage to tell her to fuck off. She wasn't that kind of person. She was polite and quiet. Maybe that's why people had no problem walking all over her. She wished she had more courage, she really did.

“Pam! Pam! Pam!” Michael's voice was calling her from his office. Just when she thought her day couldn't get any worse.

15 minutes later, on the ride home, they were silent. He had made a scene cause he had to wait for her for ten minutes, and she apologized and explained but he just didn't care. All he knew was that he was gonna be late. Still, it wasn't like she was mad at him. Lately, anger wasn't really an emotion she could manage to have. She was just worried. It was really worrisome to her that in the last week they had dined together only two nights, one of which was actually at Roy's parents' place. What kind of family were they? Maybe that was the problem: they weren't a family yet. Maybe she should have listened to Roy and just had a baby? The idea just terrified her. She just wasn't sure she could ever be a good mom. She didn't seem to have that warm and happiness good moms seems to have. Also, having a kid just to try and fix her marriage sounded way too selfish to her.

That night, sitting alone on her couch, drinking a glass of wine while watching Roman Holiday for the millionth time, she suddenly and unexpectedly started crying. She could not stop sobbing. She felt like her chest was breaking in two. There must have been something so very wrong with her for being so ungrateful for the life she had. Why couldn't she accept that she wasn't the heroine of an epic novel or the star of a romantic comedy? She was a real person and her dreams of success and greatness were just ridiculous. This was her life. There was nothing more for her out there. Not anymore, anyway. She was too old, and most of all she was married, and marriage meant she had to give up on her stupid dreams and start to live in reality. She had made her choices and there was no coming back.

She couldn't take it anymore. She put on some clothes and ventured into the crisp June night. She needed to clear her head and walking around her little town was the best way of doing it.

She went to the park, which had always been her favourite place. She sat on a swing, like she used to do when she was a kid, and just stared at the clear sky.

For some reasons, memories of a particular evening started coming back at her. She was probably 12 or 13. Her and Isabelle were sitting on that same exact spot, talking about a boy...what was his name? John Simmons? Danny McBride? All she could remember was that her best friend had a huge crush on him.

“He is so cute, and he is so nice! He picked up my pen from the floor in English class!”

“I think he looks like a mouse.” Pam was so tired of listening to her.

“He does not!” Isabelle was outraged at Pam's lack of taste in boys. “You don't understand anything about boys!”

Pam was unmoved by such an accusation. “Why should I? Boys are horrible and stupid.”

It was in that exact moment that she got hit in the face by a football, so hard that she feel off the swing, causing Isabelle to laugh hysterically. It was like the universe was trying to prove a point to her, cause the moment she opened her eyes, still laying on the grass, she saw a boy's face standing over her, looking worried and apologetic.

“I am sorry! I am so sorry! It's all my brother's fault, he is an idiot! I am so sorry! Let me help you, are you hurt?” He was talking really fast and he was offering his hand to her to help her get up. She took it and blushed a lot. He was different from the kids at school. He was tall, and his hair where a complete mess, but what really got Pam's attention where his eyes. Big, green and just so warm and kind. Something funny was happening to her, in her stomach. It was a warm feeling.

“I...I am fine, it's OK.”

“Are you sure? I am really sorry.”

“Yeah. Don't worry.” She couldn't stop staring at him and she felt very stupid. Her face felt kinda hot too. She was uncomfortable in a very weird, nice way. Maybe it was the hit on the head? Was she suffering from some sort of concussion?

He smiled at her with the cutest smile. “Good. Again, I am very sorry!” He took his ball and ran back to his brother, but before he reached him, he turned around for a second and shouted “I like your sweater!”

She watched him run towards two older guys, who were laughing and pointing at him. She couldn't look away. It was like she had lost control of her body. She was brought back to reality by Isabelle saying “ Well well well...I guess not all boys are gross to you after all...”

“I have no idea what you are talking about. We should go home, I have to do math.”

Pam wasn't really sure why she was remembering that exact evening right now, so many years later, on such a hard night for her. Maybe because that was the first time she had had feelings for a boy, even if she didn't even know his name and never saw him again, and that had made her feel very alive, like a whole knew world of possibility was opening up for her. Like the world was just waiting for her.

While she walked back home, she wondered how that cute boy was doing today. She surely hoped he was happier than her.