At five in the morning, Pam Beesly started her morning routine of rolling out of bed and into the shower. After standing under the water and washing, she set the water to cold to wake herself up. Shrieking in shock and now wide awake, she turned off the water, and shivered as she bundled up in her towel to dry off and finish her morning routine of dressing, taming her hair, and eating some toast with a side of whatever fruit happened to be closest in the bowl on her dining room table. Pam was glad that no one expected her to look good for her job, as otherwise the six in the morning start time would be a lot less manageable. As it stood, Pam worked in a sequestered corner of the Dunder Mifflin Emergency Services Station, as one of a handful of dispatchers, directing police, fire, and paramedics to their calls. Occasionally if it was busy, she would have to answer a 911 call that the operator couldn’t take, but that didn’t happen all too often with the slow-paced nature of the rural community.

Pam lived in the north-eastern area of the town, in what had once been Mifflin Village, and as such she had to cross Dreary Creek to the west, and head out to the highway overpass to get across the train tracks to the south unless she wanted to gamble and get caught waiting at a crossing. It seemed that no matter which choice one made, it was the wrong one, so Pam had long ago decided to forgo the risk, and take the highway overpass even if it did add a few minutes to her commute every morning, it was well worth it to avoid the psychic trains. Plus, the fields surrounding the town were especially beautiful at daybreak, and Pam loved to try and imprint the sunrise in her mind so that she could attempt to recreate it later when she got home.

Upon arriving in the parking lot Pam was greeted by an unusual amount of activity, in the form of what looked to be two broadcast vans bristling with equipment being unloaded in the visitors’ parking area. Intrigued but otherwise occupied with ensuring that she didn’t trip over her own feet, Pam continued on her way into the station, presenting her badge and being buzzed in by the night-watch operator. Pam was the dispatcher for day-watch, which in general ran from six in the morning until four in the afternoon, with a rotation to pull a double shift and fill in the gap between the night watch, which started at eight. Today was Monday, and thus it was not Pam’s turn to pull a double at dispatch. Phyllis, the daytime operator, was coming in at ten and would cover the gap today. That did however mean that until Phyllis got in this morning, Pam was pulling double duty as Dispatch and Operator, which meant she would be very busy.

Pam walked through the Dunder Mifflin Police Services area of the station and into the communal break area, where she deposited her lunch in the fridge and made her way back through the police administrative offices towards the back corner, where the dispatch office was. Beside the dispatch and operator’s office, was the detective’s nook, which was usually inhabited by Detective Flenderson. Directly in front of the dispatch area was a desk clump for constables to do paperwork, usually occupied by Constables Schrute and Halpert of day watch. Constable Halpert, or Jim, was Pam’s best friend at work, and sat at the desk facing her window into the office area, whereas Constable Dwight Schrute, sat with his back to her.

Pam entered the dispatch partition and shut the door behind her, making her way over to her cubicle after waving at the night operator, who’s name she still didn’t know as they had just started a few weeks ago, and sat down. Pam went through her routine, checking the call indicator light by calling her voicemail, logging in to the dispatch software, which took ages to load, and opening the operations program as well as she was covering this morning. After logging in to everything and setting herself as active, Pam rolled her chair back and caught the night operator’s eye, giving her a thumbs up to let her know that Pam was ready for handoff. They came over with a notepad and let Pam know that the only thing going on was a hospital patient transfer from Dunder Memorial to the capital, which was a two and a half to three hour round trip, so Medic-3 was out of action. Waving bye to the night dispatcher, Pam rolled back into her cubicle and waited, glancing up to see Jim stand up from his desk, giving her a wave, and heading out the door leading to the parking lot.

Shortly after Jim left the building, Pam heard the radio crackle with the message she had been anticipating.

“Dispatch this is Adam twelve, day watch clear,” came Jim’s voice over the radio.

“Adam twelve, day watch clear,” Pam confirmed as she flipped his status from off duty to patrolling on the dispatch system.

“Adam twenty two, Adam twenty two, return to the station for end of watch,” Pam called over the radio, letting the night watch officer know that he was clear to return.

“Dispatch, Adam twenty two, good copy, and good morning,” the gruff and tired sounding voice signed off, and Pam changed their status to returning to station, so that she knew to check up on them if they didn’t confirm their return in a few minutes.

“Dispatch, Medic-1 here, we are staged at Main and Mifflin,” Oscar, one of the day-watch paramedics informed her, and she updated their status accordingly.

Pam continued updating unit statuses, and as the watch change came to an end half an hour later, she was granted a brief reprieve. That was broken, however, when the phone rang, displaying the line for 911.

“Nine-one-one, what is your emergency?” Pam asked as she picked up, her on-call light flashing in her periphery.

“Uh, hi, there’s been a crash,” a shaken sounding female answered.

“Where did this happen?”

“At the corner of, uhm, Dunder, and Main Street.”

“Is anyone hurt?”

“Uh, the other driver isn’t awake… I think they hit their head”

“Were there any other vehicles involved?” Pam asked, before quickly muting her phone microphone and speaking into the radio.

“Medic-1, Truck-1, stand by for traffic,” Pam said quickly, flipping her phone back on to continue gathering information.

“No, just myself and the other car,” the caller responded.

“How long ago did this happen?”

“Just before I called you, I called as soon as I saw the other guy wasn’t awake.”

Pam switched back over to the radio, “Medic-1, Truck-1, please respond to a motor vehicle collision, at the corner of Dunder Ave and Main Street, report of one unconscious driver.”

Pam flipped back to the phone, “Ok, do you see any fuel leaking, any indication that the vehicle may catch fire such as smoke or a smell of fumes? Help is on the way, I just need as much information as possible.”

“Uhm, I’m not sure, something is leaking but it doesn’t smell.”

“Ok, thanks, can I get your name?”

Pam took their name and number, assuring them that help was on the way as she heard Truck-1 departing the garage with its siren wailing.

“Dispatch, Truck-1, en-route, ETA three minutes,” the voice of the young new firefighter informed Pam over the radio, Constable Kapoor had been quite enamoured with him as of late she recalled.

“Thanks Truck-1, advise when on-scene; Medic-1, what is your status?”

“This is Medic-1, we have arrived on scene and are assessing now, stand by,” Angela’s frosty voice informed her. Angela was the other paramedic on Medic-1.

“Copy Medic-1, standing by for situation report,” Pam paused, taking a breath, “Adam twelve, respond code three to Dunder Ave and Main Street for a motor vehicle collision, any other unit in the vicinity backup Adam twelve, code two,” she intoned.

“Adam twelve copies, I’m two away, heading there code three,” Jim responded.

“Dispatch this is Adam eleven, I will backup twelve, responding code two, ETA five minutes,” Dwight’s nasally voice squawked from her radio.

“Dispatch copies, Adam twelve responding code three, Adam eleven responding code two, no further units required at this time,” Pam said to remind the other patrol cars out there to stay in their sectors and not wander over to gawk at the crash.

Pam leaned back as radio traffic slowed again, breathing out a sigh as she loosened her shoulders. When she looked out across the office, she was perplexed by the sight that greeted her. Captain Scott, the Officer in Charge of the Dunder Mifflin Police Service, appeared to be touring the office with a large camera crew in tow, that did not bode well. Before Pam could dwell on this, the radio picked up again.

“Dispatch this is Medic-1, we’re transporting one patient to Dunder Memorial, non-expedited,” Oscar’s voice informed her.

“Copy that Medic-1, transporting one to hospital, non-urgent.”

“Dispatch, Adam twelve here, we’re code four here, returning to the station,” Jim called over the radio.

“Copy Adam twelve, scene is code four and returning to station.”

“Adam eleven, code four and returning to patrol,” Dwight cleared from the call as well.

“Copy that Adam eleven, code four and proceed with patrol.”

“Truck-1, returning to station.”

“Truck-1, back to the station,” Pam confirmed.

The rest of Pam’s morning before her break was eaten up by coordinating the cleanup of the accident scene, and a few reports on the station’s non-emergency line. By the time ten o’clock rolled around, Pam was glad that Phyllis was there so that she could take a break. Looking up from her desk, Pam caught Jim’s eye as he was doing paperwork for the earlier accident and jerked her head towards the breakroom.

Pam was just sitting down with her yogurt when Captain Scott barged into the breakroom with the gaggle of cameramen and boom operators in tow, making a beeline for her. Pam shot a panicked look around, but Jim had yet to make an appearance, and before he could Michael had corralled her into the lecture hall where she was surrounded by the film crew. Pam’s head was still kind of spinning with how fast it happened.

“Pam Beesly here is our day-watch dispatcher,” Michael was telling one of the cameras, “Not only has she got a rockin’ bod, but her voice on the radio,” he trailed off and made an exaggerated shudder, “I could listen to that all night if you know what I mean.”

“What?” Pam demanded with a frown, causing Michael to freeze like a dear caught in headlights.

“Uhm, so, anyway, Pam, this is a TV crew, they’re going to make us famous, isn’t that great,” Michael changed tack quickly, struggling to recover from his earlier comments.

“What?” Pam asked in confusion, sounding dumb to her own ears.

“Oh my word, doesn’t anyone read my memos,” Michael asked exasperatedly.

“Oh… there was a memo? I forgot to check my email this morning,” Pam admitted in embarrassment.

“No bother, I will simply regale you with the same pitch I made to the Treasurer, Ms. Levinson-Gould!” Michael exclaimed, obviously very excited to talk about whatever his master plan was.

“The TV crew here, are going to be documenting the day-to-day lives of the people behind the almighty Dunder Mifflin Emergency Services,” he began, “And as a part of that they will be interviewing everyone at various points to let the people know that we are real humans too! And did I mention that they are paying the town the big bucks for this privileged access,” he said with raised eyebrows.

Jim was sitting in the parking lot of the station familiarizing himself with the interface on the ‘Mobile Data Terminal,’ otherwise known as a chunky old laptop, when he heard the radio squawk and listened actively just long enough to determine it wasn’t for him.

“Adam ten, what’s your status,” Pam’s voice intoned in the far reaches of his awareness.

Thanks to the funding boost that the television filming had brought the township, they had finally invested in the necessary equipment to make use of the computers and tracking equipment that came with the second-hand cruisers that they operated. The old Crown Victoria’s had come to the department outfitted with GPS tracking and the ability to link into a Computer Assisted Dispatch system, but until this last week the station apparently hadn’t had the infrastructure to take advantage of it. Last week Michael had done a series of lectures on the wonders of computer assisted dispatch, but Jim shut his brain off halfway through, losing track of Michael’s analogies.

What it really boiled down to was that now Pam could know where every unit was with GPS at all times, whether or not their lights or siren were on, and give them calls without having to use the radio. That was really the biggest change, now it was everyone’s responsibility to accept calls on their computers and change their status from off-duty to patrol or on break, etcetera. Needless to say Senior Constable Hudson, who had to be almost twice Jim’s age, was not adapting well to these changes, and had over the past week forgotten to change his status before going on break a few times, causing Pam to have to check up on him. The legitimate worry was that if a police car was sitting in one place for a while with no status change, something may have happened to the officer. Hence, Pam had to call out on the radio to check up on him. Usually this wasn’t a big deal, Stanley would just reply and say he was on break at the local bakery or something.

It was odd that Stanley hadn’t responded yet, but not cause for alarm quite yet, he could after all just be in the bathroom or something… or if Jim was channeling Dwight, the bakery could be held up by masked gunmen this very minute. What felt like a minute ticked by, but Jim registered it had only been twenty seconds, tops, before the radio sounded again.

“Adam one-zero, Adam one-zero, please respond,” Pam said, sounding a bit more worried now. When no response came and the seconds seemed to drag on, the radio beeped again.

“Adam twelve, are you clear,” Pam asked, causing Jim to realise that he had forgotten to mark himself on patrol, distracted by fiddling around with his MDT.

Jim grabbed the mic from its cradle in the car and responded, “Adam 12, I’m clear.”

 “Adam twelve, clear and a call, check up on Adam ten, last known one-two-four-seven Main street, cross of third and fourth, parking lot of Tony’s Bakery. Handle code 2.”

“Adam twelve roger, check up on Adam ten at Tony’s Bakery, show me enroute.”

Jim put the cruiser in reverse and pulled out of his space, as he reached the exit of the lot he heard his computer ding and looked over to see that Pam had put the call through to it and marked him as enroute already. There was also a portion of the page showing directions to the location via GPS, but Jim disregarded that as he knew well enough where to find Stanley’s favourite bakery, having made more than a few runs in his time to get in Stanley’s good graces.

Jim pulled into the parking lot, casting his eyes about for anything untoward, but only seeing some old folks sitting out front of the bakery on a bench, and Stanley’s white on grey with yellow high-vis cruiser parked right near the door. Jim pulled in beside his car and quickly set his status to ‘on scene’ before getting out and approaching the bakery. Seeing nothing alarming, Jim stepped up, opening the door and casting his eyes about, quickly landing on Stanley, sitting in the corner with a cinnamon bun, some coffee, and the morning paper. Jim let out a sigh of relief that he hadn’t noticed he’d been holding and walked over to him.

“Hey Stanley, what’s up,” Jim asked as he stood at the end of his booth.

Stanley raised his cinnamon bun in a sort of cheers motion, before taking a slow bite out of it and grunting.

“Pam’s been trying to reach you, she sent me over to check up on you,” Jim said, fishing for some sort of response from Stanley.

Stanley looked up at him, frowning, and reached around to his back to locate the volume knob on his radio. Jim heard the small click-squelch of the radio turning on and Stanley had the decency to grimace by way of apology.

“It must have gotten turned off by the toilet paper dispenser again,” Stanley grumbled, “I swear trying to fit these belts into the can gets harder every year, those stalls are shrinking.”

Jim figured it would be in his best interest not to comment on that, and instead he brought his had to the mic on his shoulder to tell Pam all was well, “Dispatch, Adam twelve here.”

“Go ahead Adam twelve,” Pam sounded a little stressed.

“Stanley’s fine, his radio just got turned off, we’re good here.”

“Copy that Adam twelve, mark yourself clear and proceed with patrol,” Pam sounded relieved and annoyed, Jim could only imagine how the situation must feel like with only dots on a map and the radio to paint a picture.

Jim waved goodbye to Stanley and started walking back to his patrol car.

“Adam ten, come in Adam ten,” Pam called from the speaker on his shoulder, and he heard it echo from Stanley’s booth.

“Go for Adam ten,” Came Stanley’s doubled response as Jim exited the doors.

“Adam ten, meet el ten on tac two,” Pam said coolly.

‘Uh oh,’ thought Jim, ‘Stanley’s in trouble,’ L-10 was Michael’s callsign, which meant that Stanley was probably about to be chewed out. Although, maybe not, as Michael seemed to be kind of scared of Stanley sometimes.

“Roger, switching to tac-two,” came Stanley’s bored reply.

Jim was glad for the department’s sake that the cameras were following Medic-1 around today, so they hadn’t just witnessed that embarrassing moment for Stanley.

The rest of watch passed quickly for Jim, he stole Dwight’s favourite spot at the bottom of the overpass and ran radar, pulling over a few speeders before it was time to pack it in and return to the station. Jim made a beeline for the locker room and took his time stowing his equipment in his locker, securing his sidearm and placing his radio on a charger near the door. It was a Friday, so Jim showered before changing out of uniform, as usually a group of people from the station went over to Kev’s. Pam usually didn’t join them, citing that she didn’t enjoy watching people get drunk, but Jim was hoping he could convince her to come along today as they didn’t get to spend much time together outside of work, and even at work it was limited to breaks with her being locked in the glass box that was dispatch.

Pam had been Jim’s dispatcher since he joined the police service. His parent’s had originally wanted him to take the LSAT’s and become a lawyer after he got his degree, but after dragging his feet for long enough and failing a couple, he finally got the courage up to go his own way and decided that he wanted to help people in a more impactful way. Somehow Jim found himself accepting a job offer from the DMPS and moving just over forty-five minutes away from his family home to live and work out of Dunder Mifflin. After a year partnered with salty old Stanley, Jim had been promoted to solo patrols, and that’s what he had been doing for the last five years. From what little Jim had been able to gleam of Pam’s personal life over the years, she had taken her first year of university before stopping to come back home to Dunder Mifflin to help with some family issue. She got a job working in dispatch somehow, Jim thought there might be some family connection with the way Stanley treated her sometimes, but he’d never been able to work up the nerve to ask what that was about. Jim was all too aware that the vacancy that he’d filled at the station that was a taboo subject to this day, no one talked about whatever had happened to the constable before him.

Jim was walking with his head down, deep in thought when he heard Pam’s voice off to his right. Jim looked up and was surprised to see that Pam was still in the office, usually she did dispatch handoff and snuck out. Jim barely registered that she was talking to Kelly as he turned on his heel to approach, determined to ask her to join them at Kev’s.

“Hey Pam,” Jim shot an apologetic look to Kelly as he realised that he had interrupted her, but pressed on, “Are you free for dinner and drink’s at Kev’s? A bun-”

Pam cut him off abruptly, “Yes,” before he could even finish asking the question, looking at him with the wide eyes that she usually reserved for miming ‘Save me!’ when Michael was particularly unbearable.

“Ok, cool, well I’m heading out now, did you want a ride?”

“Yup, sure,” Pam said cheerily as she practically skipped over to his side, leaving Kelly behind, mouth agape.

“We’d better get out of here before she recovers,” Jim said in a stage whisper as he made his way towards the door with Pam by his side.

“Don’t need to tell me twice,” Pam said as she covered her mouth with her hand, eyes twinkling with mischief.

The drive to Kevin’s bar wasn’t too long, it was on Main Street about half a block up from Tony’s Bakery. Jim pulled out of the station lot and hooked a left on Dunder to head the one block over to Main. As he made the left onto Main Jim heard Pam clear her throat beside him and snuck a glance at her, she was staring intently out the passenger side and in the reflection on the window she didn’t look happy. Pam caught him and he was relieved when she shot a small smile at him via the reflection.

It was quiet in the car until they were coming up on Greenflower Ave, “Thanks for saving me from Kelly back there,” Jim was relieved to have the silence broken.

Jim looked over to give her an easy smile, “Any time Beesly,” he paused, weighing his next words, “If you don’t mind my asking, what exactly did I save you from?”

“A double date with Kelly,” Pam sighed, “I’ve been trying to get out of it for weeks but tonight I finally ran out of excuses,” she finished with a small shrug.

“Why didn’t you go?” Jim wished he could kick himself; did he really just ask her why she didn’t go on a date? He fumbled momentarily, “Usually agreeing with Kelly is the quickest way out,” he added, rubbing the back of his neck and mentally crossed his fingers.

“Ask me again after a few drinks,” Pam said as he pulled into a parking space, looking up to see the neon sign for ‘Kevin’s Bar and Grill and Chilli’ flashing brightly before them.

Pam exited his car and headed for the doors before he could say anything else, although she did walk slowly enough for him to catch up, so at least there was that. Upon entering the bar Jim noted that their coworkers had already filled a table, so he and Pam moved to sit in the booth that was along the wall close to it. Jim sat next to her, justifying it in his head as leaving more room in the booth for any latecomers to sit. Of course the moment Jim’s mind fabricated that justification he also tore it to shreds, as he did a quick headcount and found that the usual end of watch gang was already there, including Phyllis the operator, Salty Stanley, Oscar who was a paramedic with a great dry wit about him, and Fire Chief Bernard who seemed to always be reliving the college glory days. All that was missing was Kelly, but Jim supposed that she was probably still going on the date that she tried to rope Pam into. There were also a few other firefighters sprinkled around, but they didn’t appear to be hanging out as part of the unit. After getting settled in the booth, Jim ordered a beer to start and Pam jumped straight to a vodka tonic.

Jim have her a look, raising his eyebrows, and she just stuck her tongue out at him before proceeding to drain the it before Jim was even halfway through his beer. Pam then ordered a lite beer and Jim couldn’t help but quirk an eyebrow at her again.

“What,” Pam defended, “The first one was to get me started, and now this is me drinking socially!”

Jim chuckled, “Ok, whatever you say Beesly,” and continued to sip his first beer.

Pam took her beer a lot slower, they passed the time chatting idly and teasing each other, falling into the easy rhythm that they had at the station. At some point Phyllis moved over to their table and Toby joined them as well a short while later. Pam had just ordered some of Kevin’s house chilli and Jim settled for a burger and fries when Phyllis excused herself to go home for the night and Toby wandered off towards the bathroom. While he was gone someone cleared away his glass and before he got back Stanley and Oscar decided to join them in the booth to get away from Andy. Jim didn’t say anything about Toby’s spot and Pam seemed very interested in conducting an archeological dig in her Chilli bowl. When Toby made his way back over, he didn’t say anything and went to sit quietly with the firefighters for a few minutes, before making his exit with little fanfare.

Jim chatted with Stanley and Oscar for a while, and Pam chimed in occasionally, it was clear she was pretty buzzed by this point. When Stanley made to leave, she nudged Jim out of the booth and gave Stanley a big hug, which Jim was surprised to see him return, before he bid them adieu. Jim thought he heard Pam scolding Stanley for giving them such a scare earlier. Oscar left shortly after and Pam got out to hug him too, and then they were alone in the booth again, sharing the lukewarm fries left over from Jim’s supper. There was a lull in conversation and for a while they just people watched, Pam pointing out things to giggle at, as Jim made faces at her, causing her to lose it all over again.

Pam was having a great time just sitting next to Jim and people watching, it helped that Jim made the best faces, she was a giggly drunk. Not that she was drunk yet, she had only had a vodka-something and a beer and a half. She was pleasantly tipsy, and in good company. She had almost forgotten about the double date of doom, when a reminder ambled along into her field of view and looked her way, changing course to intercept. Could you intercept a stationary object, Pam questioned herself, not that it really mattered; what did matter was that she was pretty sure the brute couldn’t see her hidden behind Jim in the back of the booth. That meant that he was coming over to talk to Jim – curse his charismatic personality, why did everyone need to talk to Jim? She braced herself as he stomped closer to the booth, looking to Jim to see if he noticed the approach. Jim turned his body outward as the man approached.

“Halpert,” the man exclaimed happily, clapping Jim on the shoulder as Pam tried to cower without looking like she was, pressing her back against the booth seat to narrow her profile.

“Anderson,” Jim acknowledged while he shook hands with the man – Sheriff’s Officer Roy Anderson.

‘Don’t sit down, don’t sit down, don’t sit down,’ Pam chanted in her head, tensing against Jim’s back.

Roy slid into the opposite side of the booth and set his drink down at the same time, before finally glancing over at her, recognition dawning on his face.

‘Oh my god, why does the world hate me,’ was all Pam could think before he spoke again.

“Pammy?”

“Pammy,” She heard Roy ask, silently fuming at how much she hated when he had called her that back in the day.

“Uh, hi Roy,” Pam said, forcing a smile – convinced that anyone would be able to take one look at her and tell it was fake.

“What are you doing here,” Roy gestured around to indicate the bar, “The Indian chick said you couldn’t come out tonight.”

Pam noticed Jim give her a quick look that she interpreted as ‘Is this guy for real?’ before he turned to address Roy, “You mean Constable Kapoor?”

“Kapoor, yeah,” Roy nodded, oblivious to the misstep, “So anyway, Pammy, what gives? I thought we were going on a date tonight,” he complained.

Pam wanted a way out of this encounter – fast. The last thing she ever wanted to do in her life was to go on another date with Roy Anderson, the last one hadn’t gone so well. Sure, it had been years since it happened, and he may have been young and stupid, but Pam wasn’t going to give him the benefit of the doubt here, he struck out as far as she was concerned. Pam looked over at Jim quickly to see if he could help her and noticed that hist left hand was resting on the table close to her right. Pam didn’t think that Jim would mind being her out, so she bumped his elbow lightly to get his attention and moved her hand to his, turning it over so that she could grasp it palm to palm.

Jim felt Pam nudge him and turned his head to look down at her when she surprised him by grabbing his hand. He had not been expecting that. When he met her eyes, he saw her beaming ‘Save me!’ into his brain for the second time that night. Evidently, she really didn’t like Anderson, and while he wasn’t Jim’s favourite person, he couldn’t say that he hated the guy, so he was a little confused as to why Pam was trying to get rid of him. Regardless, Jim realised that this must have been her half of the double date, and if she really didn’t want him around, Jim would happily oblige her if it meant he got to hold her hand a while longer.

“Sorry,” Pam sounded decidedly not sorry, “I had plans already,” she said as she not so subtly interlaced her fingers with Jim’s on the table in front of them and shot a nervous smile at Jim.

“Wow, I see how it is,” Roy scowled, “Way to get a guy’s hopes up,” he made to get out of the booth.

“Roy – I never agreed to,” Pam started before Roy cut her off.

“Whatever Pammy,” He exited the booth and started to stomp past Jim, pausing to clap him on the shoulder again, “She’s not worth the trouble Halpert,” he shot before stomping off in a huff towards the bar.

Jim’s head was spinning with how fast everything had just happened, and so he tried to slow his thoughts down and take stock of the revelations. First, Sheriff’s Officer Roy Anderson was apparently the other half of Pam’s double date. Second, Pam didn’t like Roy. Third, Pam and Roy had a history, maybe? Fourth, Pam disliked or was uncomfortable around Roy. Finally, Roy now evidently disliked Pam. Where all that left Jim, he had no idea, but he was pretty sure fake date was worse than friendzone, so he was going to have to try hard to get out of that one. Jim turned back in towards Pam, with so many questions whirring through his mind that he wasn’t sure where to start.

“What just happened,” He settled on, and Pam gave him a sheepish look as she blushed, colour creeping up her neck.

She hadn’t taken her hand back, so there was that small consolation Jim reckoned.

“Well that was Roy Anderson,” She trailed off, “You know he drives the prison van…”

“With you so far here Bees,” Jim nodded, giving her a faux-serious face, earning a little smile from her before she continued.

“What you don’t know is that him and I dated for a little back in high school,” she paused, “It was a disaster,” she said as rubbed her forehead with her free hand.

“Oh, this I have to hear,” Jim was genuinely curious to hear about high school Beesly, and this was too good to pass up.

“You have to promise not to laugh at me,” she looked him in the eyes, and he nodded solemnly with his right hand placed dramatically over his heart, “It’s really embarrassing, and in hindsight it was stupid, but I was young, and he was a football player…”

“Suffice it to say I was an artsy kid, so I didn’t garner a lot of male attention, so when the star football player asks you if you want to join them for a hockey game, well, I jumped at the opportunity, because hey, he was cute and… yeah,” She took a breath before continuing.

Jim in the meantime was trying to listen attentively, but she was making it really difficult with the nervous patterns she was rubbing against his hand. He was convinced that she wasn’t doing it consciously, but regardless it was really distracting. He made sure that he nodded and mhmm’d at all the right places though, so he was pretty sure he was safe so long as she didn’t ask him a question.

“So, we go to this hockey thing, and it’s not just him but his brother too, like way to kill the mood, right? Not only that but they managed to get a few beers without being carded, and didn’t share, not that I wanted any, but it’s the principle of the thing. Anyhow, it gets to the end of the game, and I have to go pee. So, I duck off, go do that and return, only to find out that they left me there,” Pam rolls her eyes.

“So I call my house and my dad answers the phone,” she piqued Jim’s interest, he’d never really heard too much about her father, “He had just gotten home from work, so he came to get me. When my dad pulls up, Roy and his brother Kenny finally make a re-appearance, and they get into a really vocal argument with my dad and then he threatened to have them arrested for underage drinking, so they went packing.”

“That is definitely a contender for worst first date ever,” Jim managed to focus long enough to comment.

“Oh, just you wait, there’s more, teenaged me agreed to go out for a second date after he bought me a bunch of cheap flowers to say sorry, and he spilt his drink down my shirt.”

Jim was struggling to hold in a chuckle, he had his right hand pressed over his mouth, but he knew he wasn’t fooling anyone. Pam just narrowed her eyes at him, seemingly daring him to laugh.

“That’s not even the best of it, so after all this goes down, he has the audacity to ask me on a third date about a week later. I turn him down, and I later find out that at the time he asked me he was already going on dates with one of the cheerleaders,” Pam finishes with a laugh of her own, and Jim takes this as permission to let out his own chuckle.

“Wow, Bees that was a ride,” Jim got out between chuckles, “At least he set the bar really low for first dates for the rest of your life.”

They passed the half hour or so with Jim retelling some of his worst dates, of which there were quite a few. Jim was a funny guy, and back in the day he hadn’t really been a looker, and so a lot of his dates had ended with the cliched ‘Let’s just be friends.’ Pam talked a bit about her art, and how she liked to take walks along the gravel roads just north of where she lived to the old dump hill, where she could look out over the prairie and farmland that surrounded Dunder Mifflin, with the occasional windbreak or bush interspersed. Jim had always thought that Pam was cute, funny, and just bright, but this was a whole other side of her that he never got to see in their stolen moments at work in the breakroom or meetings. Jim couldn’t help wanting to learn all he could about her.

Eventually, Pam started trying to stifle yawns, but as always Jim seemed to know anyway. She didn’t want this weirdly wonderful evening to end, but she reluctantly agreed that it was time to go sleep off the alcohol when he offered to drive her home and come back tomorrow to take her to her car. Jim was very gentlemanly, opening doors for her and then walking her to the door of her tiny bungalow, and she couldn’t help the smile on her face when she turned to bid him goodnight.

“Thanks for letting me come along tonight Jim,” She trailed off, unsure what else she should add, she didn’t want to misinterpret his attentiveness tonight.

This had been one of the best nights she’d had in a long time, sometimes it felt like she had just been coasting in life ever since her dad – Pam stopped that train of thought before she teared up, and thankfully Jim was speaking when she looked up again, and he didn’t seem to have noticed that she was a hairs breadth away from breaking down.

“Any time Beesly, I’d love to do that again,” He smirked, Pam loved the way his eyes lit up when he smiled like that, “Maybe we can even manage to do it without any disgruntled exes around,” he finished with a quirked eyebrow and Pam lost it, he always seemed to know how to make her laugh.

“Yeah, definitely,” She managed after her giggles had subsided.

Jim and Pam bid each other goodnight. Pam watched from her front window as his taillights disappeared down the street before losing sight of them, and then went to bed. Sleep found her quickly.

The next morning after some water and painkillers, Pam decided that she wanted pancakes, and so she mixed up some batter and warmed the stovetop. She had just finished mixing the batter when she remembered that the proportions that her dad had taught her all those years ago for their Sunday morning breakfasts made way more than she could eat, it fed her entire family. Pam texted Jim and asked if he had eaten breakfast yet, and when he answered no, she offered that he come over and eat some pancakes for the greater good, so that she wouldn’t have to eat leftovers all week. Jim texted back that he’d be right over. Pam couldn’t remember what part of town he lived in, so she quickly ran into her room to throw on clothes and pushed her hair back into a sloppy ponytail. She was somewhat presentable when she heard knocking at her front door. she hadn’t had a chance to put her contacts in, so she ran to open the door and greeted Jim wearing her glasses.

Morning Beesly was the latest in Jim’s internal catalogue of Pam, which had previously been filled with pages of Work Pam, with a few Work Function Pam’s sprinkled around like salt. Morning Beesly was definitely his favourite so far, as she greeted him at the door of her cute house wearing a t-shirt with ‘Faculty of Arts’ emblazoned in cracked white lettering on it, a pair of comfortable looking sweats, glasses, and her hair back in a ponytail which he had never had the pleasure of seeing before. Usually work and work function Pam wore her hair clipped back with a barrette, presumably to keep it away from her ears to make it easier to wear her headset. She invited him in and showed him to her small dining room kitchen combo.

There was a lot of Pancake batter, Jim observed, and so he suggested that they both get a pan and start flipping. Jim amused himself by observing how their techniques differed, Pam made her pancakes much flatter than him, spreading the batter all the way around the pan, whereas his ended up stout, as he usually just poured it and let nature take it’s course. By the end Jim estimated they had enough pancakes to feed four people, with Pam coming out in the lead for quantity as Jim’s took a bit longer to make.

“Beesly, you should have invited some more people over, there is no way we are finishing all these,” Jim gestured to the serving platter stacked with steaming pancakes, “Why didn’t you like, halve the recipe or something?”

“It was my dad’s recipe,” Pam said with a small shrug, as if that was all that needed to be said.

They ate their way through the stack of pancakes valiantly, but they only made it about halfway through. They finished drinking their mugs of coffee and tea respectively before Pam got up and insisted that she pack up some of the leftovers for him. Jim was encouraged by the small gesture when he noticed that all his pancakes had stayed behind with her, and with that they were on the road. When they pulled into the parking lot Jim decided that he was going to take a chance, and he hoped to god it didn’t backfire. Being best friends with Pam was great, but if there was any chance that they could be more than that, Jim was going to jump for it. He was at a point in his life where being an eligible bachelor just wasn’t what he wanted to be doing for the foreseeable future, and he could imagine a future with Pam in it, a very attractive and fun-filled one at that. So Jim pulled into a spot a row over from Pam’s car, and got out to open the door for her to that he could walk her over to her car.

“You know,” Jim ventured as they crossed the lot, “Some people might say that we had our first date last night,” he affected nonchalance, but inside he was dreading the possible repercussions of being so forward.

“No,” Pam said incredulously, and Jim’s heart dropped, he couldn’t bring himself to look at her face as he stopped a few paces from her car.

“You don’t get to do that,” she continued, “You cannot retroactively declare it a date, I won’t stand for it,” a hint of mischief snuck into her tone and Jim hazarded meeting her gaze.

“What,” he asked dumbly, seeing a hint of a smirk on her face and not quite sure how to take it. That was either really good, or really bad.

“I demand to be wooed, Halpert,” Pam declared, a smile finally lighting up her face as her eyes sparkled, “You are going to have to do better than that.”

Jim was disappointed to find out that Pam had a prior commitment Saturday, apparently it was tradition to have supper with her mother and sister every other Saturday and so she couldn’t go out with him. The upshot to all that was it was Pam who suggested they meet in the park for a picnic lunch on Sunday, surprising Jim with her assertiveness, and at the same time assuring him that she had an equal stake in whatever it was they were becoming. Jim was hard pressed to remember many details of the picnic in the park overlooking the reservoir just south of town, but what he did remember was that Pam was smiling widely the entire time, and it was contagious. They had a great time just talking and taking in the scenery. It was Monday morning and Jim still felt like his face was sore from smiling so much.

Jim went through his morning routine at the station, he changed into uniform, checked everything was in its place in his utility belt, checked the charge on his stun gun, put the belt on, and loaded and holstered his service pistol. Jim grabbed a radio off the chargers and double checked it was on the right channel and fully charged before putting it in the pouch on his belt and running the mic up to his shoulder and clipping it there. The forecast said there was a risk of rain, so Jim grabbed his DMPS branded high visibility rain jacket before heading out to the office where Michael held the morning briefings. Jim gave Pam a wave and a smile as he laid the jacket down on his desk and waited for Michael to come out of his office to send them off.

“All right, good morning constabros,” Michael started bombastically, emerging from his office brandishing his clipboard, “There’s not a whole lot going on out there, other than that the Hutterites at the Woodlands colony are complaining about some trespassers hunting on their property, but night shift  didn’t turn anything up when they swung by,” Michael paused, flipping a page.

“In other news, Mayor Wallace wants us really dogging those school zones, anyone going over thirty klicks is getting a ticket, and fines are doubled. All right, that’s all folks, anything to add?”

Nobody said anything and everyone started getting up to head out on patrol.

“Sounds good, hit the road suckers,” Michael shot at their backs as they headed out to the lot.

Jim figured that Dwight would be all over the school zones even though they weren’t his usual patrol area. Jim usually patrolled the southeastern part of town, which was mainly residential, but it also had some of the larger retailers and the agricultural shops. Jim liked it because he could stop Dwight from talking about all the incredible new farm implements by denying him the patrol area. With Wallace’s crackdown on school zones though, Jim didn’t want to be anywhere near there this week, and so he found himself north of the tracks, patrolling the residential area where lower income folks generally lived, Pam and himself included. As he’d discovered over the weekend, he lived practically just across the creek from Pam, he was five blocks west of her and two blocks south.

Jim stopped at the Coop gas bar to grab some more coffee and was chatting with the attendant when his radio chirped.

“Adam twelve, Dispatch,” Pam’s voice crackled from his shoulder.

Jim grabbed the mic off his shoulder, giving the attendant a wave as he chucked his now empty coffee and started making his way back to the car, “Go for Adam twelve.”

“Are you responding to the call on screen?”

‘Oops,’ Jim thought to himself, he forgot to change his status when he pulled into the gas station, and so Pam had dropped a call on his computer.

“Sorry Dispatch,” Jim said as he clambered into the car, “Just got back to the car now, I’m rolling,” he glanced over at his screen to see a call waiting for him.

“Update your status Adam twelve, Dispatch out,” Jim heard a hint of annoyance.

It was only fair, he understood that there wasn’t really much point to the computer aided dispatching if he wasn’t updating the system to say that he was out of service temporarily, causing Pam to have to follow up with the call as he stood around shooting the breeze with the pump attendant.

The details of the call stated it was for a report of property damage at the Woodlands Colony, nothing further, and so Jim rolled out towards the highway after changing his status to responding. The colony itself was about twenty minutes north by the highway, and another ten on gravel roads, so Jim lost himself to autopilot and just listened to the radio calls as background chatter. Dwight was calling in a license plate check, likely having pulled over some poor soul going thirty-five in the schoolzone. Stanley was requesting permission to go for lunch at the local diner, and meanwhile Kelly was responding to juveniles loitering someplace – sounded residential. By the time Jim was pulling up the Colony’s gravel winding driveway, Kelly had cleared off her call, and Dwight seemed to be on another traffic stop. It sounded as though Jim had been wise to avoid that end of town today.

Jim drove past the big block houses and communal areas towards the back of the colony, where he could see a couple of white trucks and a van parked with quite the assortment of men dressed in various patterned shirts tucked into dark slacks. Jim pulled his car off to the side and got out near a large barn, meant to hold pigs if he smelled correctly. Jim spotted Minister Hofer in the crowd as set himself to on-scene and exited the car, making his way over.

“Hello Constable,” Hofer greeted him with his usual slow pace and strong low-german accent, “Thanks for coming out.”

“No problem Mr. Hofer,” Jim shook his hand after they had closed the distance, “Mind telling me what’s the trouble?”

“Why sure, if you’d follow me jus’ over here,” Hofer gestured to the pig pen and they started walking.

When the got closer, Jim could see that some of the men had cleared an area in the pen.

“You see, the trouble is somebody has shot one of our pigs,” Hofer exclaimed, pointing to the dead beast lying in the mud with a bloody hole in it, “Maybe not on purpose mind you, but its dead as a doornail.”

“D’ya mind telling me when you noticed this,” Jim asked, noticing that he’d subconsciously slowed his speech down to match the cadence of the minister, chuckling internally at how that worked.

“First light was when we noticed it, must have been those hunters that were shootin’ around last night if you ask me,” he answered with a huff, “Probably shot at a dear in the clearing and missed, overshootin’ into the poor pig here.”

Jim cast his eyes about to survey the scene. The Colony was built in a windbreak, the trees started about three hundred metres out, so it wasn’t an entirely impossible scenario, but anyone shooting from the forest would be able to see the lights on the barn and other buildings, meaning they knew they were shooting towards inhabited buildings. At the same time, the stark white barn and its lights could probably do well silhouetting a target out in the clearing.

Jim continued to interview Minister Hofer, asking all the standard questions such as how much was the pig worth, was there anyone who would want to hurt the pig, anyone angry with the colony or slighted in a deal, etcetera. Eventually Jim had completed the crime report form and went back to his car to call for Toby, as the value of the pig and the possibility of illegal discharge of a weapon meant that the incident had to be investigated.

“Dispatch, Adam twelve,” Jim said into the mic that he had grabbed from its cradle in the car.

“Adam twelve, go ahead.”

“Can you get H-ten to meet me on tac two?”

Pam depressed her talk button and replied to Jim’s radio message, “Adam twelve roger, standby.”

Pam knocked on the glass window to her right, startling Toby, and slid the little thing open. That window always made Pam feel like she was working in a drive through or something.

“Yeah,” Toby asked as he spun around from his desk facing the wall, leaning on his knees towards her as he came to a stop.

“Jim wants you on channel two,” Pam said as she gestured to her headset with her free hand, and before he had finished giving her a response she was pulling the window closed and turning back to her computer to deal with the incessant dinging that was a fresh call waiting to be dispatched that had come in to Phyllis. As Pam dropped the call onto Kelly’s screen, she noticed Toby getting up and putting his jacket on, heading towards the door. Jim must have discovered something that required detecting.

Pam glanced out into the office and had to stop herself from flinching, a cameraman was standing not six feet in front of her on the other side of the window and practically all she could see was a big dark lens staring her down. It was unnerving how they moved around the office so stealthily. Thankfully due to the ‘sensitive operations environment’ that she worked in the cameras weren’t allowed in the operations room. This didn’t stop them from holding cameras up to her window and staring her down like they were right now though, and Pam was hard pressed not to roll her eyes at the camera guy, because really, what was so interesting about her and  her job? Pam thought it was suspect how they kept showing up whenever Jim had lunch in the station with her, almost like they were looking for ‘character drama’ or something. Pam was really good at pretending to be busy, so that’s what she did between checking up on all the patrol cars out there and assigning the trickle of calls that came in.

Pam was jolted from her routine by the phone ringing, glancing down at the caller ID showed that Phyllis was conferencing her in to a 911 call. Pam hit the headset button and found the home keys on her keyboard, preparing to dispatch.

“Caller from the RM of Dunder Mifflin, report of a reckless driver,” Phyllis intoned by way of handoff.

“Have there been any accidents,” Pam asked the caller, trying to ascertain the situation.

“Not right now, no, but the guy was weaving through traffic on the highway going stupid fast,” a younger sounding male informed her.

“Where are you now?”

“I’m sitting at the Coop gas bar; I noticed the truck had pulled in when I was driving past.”

“What make or model is the truck?”

While Pam was asking these questions, she glanced over at her screen with the GPS locations of all the units on patrol, noticing that Jim had cleared off his earlier call and was making his way back into town.

“It’s a black ford, with an extended cab, newish?”

“Can you read the license plate? Are there any other identifying features that would make it stand out?”

“I can’t read it too well from where I’m sitting, but it starts with foxtrot-oscar-xray, the truck has a big lift and tires on it as well.”

“Adam twelve, requesting lunch at the station,” Jim called from the radio, coming in her left ear while the phone call went on in her right.

“Ok, thank you sir, please hang on the line while I get an officer heading that way, in the meantime the operator is going to ask you a few more questions,” Pam thanked the man for the details and muted the phone as she switched over to the police radio channel. She could hear Phyllis asking for contact information in her right ear as the radio squawked in her left.

“Adam twelve, proceed with patrol and handle this call, respond to the north end Coop gas bar for a reckless driver there now, vehicle described as a black late model ford pickup, with lift kit and tires, partial plate foxtrot-oscar-xray, handle code two,” Pam intoned.

“Adam twelve roger, reckless driver at north end Coop gas, black lifted ford pickup, partial plate foxtrot-oscar-xray, show me enroute,” Jim’s voice came back, the growl of the Crown Victoria’s V8 engine could be heard in the background.

“Showing you enroute at fourteen-eleven,” Pam ended the conversation, she unmuted the phone call and spoke again.

“Alright sir, an officer will be there shortly, are you able to stay on the line with me until they arrive,” Pam glanced over to the map as Jim’s dot jumped closer and closer to the gas station, he was about two minutes away she reckoned, he had just exited onto the service road.

“Yeah, sure.”

“Perfect, where is the driver now?”

“I think he just went in to pay.”

“Could you describe him; Height, build, age, clothes that sort of thing?”

“Uhh, if I had to guess he’d be late forties, bigger white dude with grey hair, wearing a brown jacket and khaki pants.”

Pam added all of the information she and Phyllis had gathered from the call and dropped it into the information area on Jim’s screen, including the caller’s vehicle description so Jim could talk to them when he got there.

“Right on, the officer should be pulling up any moment now, stay with me until he pulls up and let me know if the driver starts making his way towards his truck, ok?”

“Sounds good, will do.”

They sat on the line in awkward silence for a minute before the radio and caller broke it simultaneously.

“Adam twelve, show me on-scene,” Jim’s voice crackled from the radio at the same time as the caller spoke.

“I think the officer just pulled up, he parked in front of the truck.”

“Perfect, he’ll come over to talk to you in a minute if you could just stay put, I’ve got your information down so I’m going to end the call with you now, ok?”

“Ok, bye.”

“Thanks for calling, bye,” Pam hung up.

“Adam twelve on-scene, fourteen-fourteen,” Pam acknowledged Jim and flipped his status for him.

A few minutes passed, and just as Pam was about to check up on Jim when she saw his status flip to returning to station.

“Dispatch, Adam twelve.”

“Go for dispatch Adam twelve.”

“Dispatch could you roll me a tow-truck for this black ford, I’ve got one in custody for DUI, heading back to the station now.”

“Copy Adam twelve, rolling a tow-truck for impound,” Pam said as she glanced over at her side screen to confirm that he’d updated the license plate on the call.

‘Oh boy, that’s going to be a staticus dramaticus,’ Pam thought to herself as she read the updated notes on the callout. The detained individual was one Kenneth Anderson.

Roy’s brother.