A funny Christmas gift was OK. They were still on tenuous ground, figuring out where they stood with one another and certainly not ready for anyone at work to catch on. So the DVD of that awful movie they had seen together was fine – an inside joke without much sentiment to bog things down. But that was a month and a half ago. Apparently a lot can change in a month and a half.

“A book? You got me a Charlie Brown book for Valentine’s Day? What, was it the closest thing to the door when you walked into Waldenbooks?”

This was not going well.

Luckily, they had decided to celebrate Valentine’s Day on Friday the 16th, rather than on the actual day, with the thought that a.) Wednesday was not a very romantic night and b.) the morning after would be much more enjoyable on a Saturday. So Karen had the entire weekend to be pissed without having to look at his stupid, guilty, puppy-dog face. By Sunday night, however, she had relented.

 “Hey.”

“Hey! I’m really glad you called. I am so sorry about the stupid gift – it was totally thoughtless of me and I really, really want to make it up to you.”

“Yeah, I kind of got that from the 3 dozen roses you sent over. Original.”

“Well, um, what about-”

“No, I got the necklace too. It’s nice. Lovely, actually. A definite improvement over Charles Schultz.”

“So…are we ok?”Karen wanted to say yes, but something was nagging in her brain. “Jim, we’ve been dating for how long now?”It was meant as a rhetorical question, but he piped up before she could continue.

“Um, like, two months?”

“Wait, what?”

“What?”

“Jim, I moved from Connecticut in the middle of November. Do you not think we were dating before that?”

“What? No…I…”

“You know what? I was going to say before, that we were at the three month mark, which I know can be weird, but that I really like you and really hoped we were getting closer. I thought that you felt for me as much as I feel for you and that you were over her. Clearly, I misinterpreted things.”

Karen could not have known how much her words stung him, and he fumbled for the right response before giving up and settling on the true one.“That’s…my fault. I know, and I’m sorry. I really wanted this to work out.”

“Yeah, me too.” She sighed before hanging up.

Jim stared at the phone for a moment before flipping it closed. He had totally ruined things with Karen, a charming and attractive woman who was (can you imagine?) actually interested in him, for what? No good reason, as far as he could tell. He wondered about Pam, and what her Valentine’s Day had been like. At work, he had given everyone those little cards that third graders are obligated to pass out to the whole class. As silly as they were, he had agonized over giving Pam the “You Slay Me” Puss in Boots card or the one with the picture of Princess Fiona looking all hot. In the end, he went with “Hope your Valentine’s Day has a happy ending!” and hoped the picture of Shrek and the Princess married wasn’t too suggestive of anything. He was pretty sure her first Valentine’s Day alone couldn’t have been all that great and now feeling down in the dumps himself, he almost wished he could call her, just to talk. Sometimes it really sucked not having his best friend.  

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* 

Pam knew it was absolutely ridiculous. And she had almost no intention at first of actually giving Jim the red water bottle. It was just a really pretty color, and he had been drinking more water than soda lately and well, truth be told it would perfectly fit all those little things she had stockpiled in her drawer at work. The red jelly beans she knew he liked, the yogurt lid from the one time Fancy New Beesly tried Chocolate instead of her standard Mixed Berries (and what a mistake that was), the mini-packets of Skittles Kevin had shared with everyone on Halloween (“trying to get more fruit in my diet” he explained), and other miscellaneous stuff she had tucked away when something reminded her of Jim. Which as it turned out had been quite often. It made her a little less sad at the time, to save something with the hopes of someday sitting down and explaining the stories to him, all the insane things that kept happening in Scranton even after he left. So even knowing that he was probably out with Karen and probably blissfully happy (right?) she went with her impulse and grabbed the water bottle.

She didn’t even have the courage to bring it to work on Wednesday, and when Jim gave her the silly, meaningless card, she knew it was the right choice. He had moved on, he was happy and she would just have to learn to accept it.

Over the weekend, Pam began to reconsider. It would just be something funny and light between friends, maybe even stuff he could laugh about with Karen. She thought of all the little things Jim had done over the years to make her feel good and how much she still cherished the bonus gifts from Christmas a year ago. Surely there was nothing wrong with her now trying to do the same for him?

Monday came and Pam tucked the water bottle under her desk, planning to grab him right as he came in. But Karen came in first, looking tired but trying to mask it as she gave Pam an overly cheerful “Morning!” Jim followed a few minutes later and was much less successful at hiding how awful he felt. He barely looked up as he passed Pam with the briefest “Hey”. The rest of the morning was quiet and Pam noticed Jim looking at Karen every 20 minutes while Karen stabbed at her keyboard. Finally, at least the phone rang.

Pam looked up to catch the expression on Karen’s face when she picked up the phone, but it was a studied blank.

It was hard not to be nosey when you work in reception. Most of the calls go through your phone, detailed messages have to be copied and relayed and eventually you get really good at sensing what’s going on. Karen purposely kept her end of the conversation vague, and Jim had retreated to the break room after he heard who was on the other end of the line. No one else would have even noticed, but to Pam, it sounded an awful lot like Karen was leaving for a job at Corporate in New York.

The rest of the day dragged. Kelly chattered away through the entire lunch break about the awesome things she and Ryan had done over the weekend, especially their super-duper romantic dinner on Friday. Jim still wouldn’t meet Pam’s eyes and it was driving her nuts. She was afraid to get her hopes up, and then she felt terrible for actually hoping that her best friend had been dumped.  She thought of the cheery red bottle stashed under her desk and wondered if it would be totally inappropriate or exactly what he needed.

 4:45 rolled around and before Pam could reconsider she typed a quick IM and hit Send:

Talk after work? 

Are you Ok? would have been totally ridiculous, as he clearly was not. She held her breath for a moment before: 

Yeah, sure. Jim turned and glanced up at her for the first time that day, and gave her a half-hearted smile that let Pam know just how sad he was.

They didn’t have to worry about being interrupted, as Karen breezed out 14 minutes later. Dwight and Angela left 7 and 7.5 minutes after that, respectively. Pam sometimes wondered how it was possible she could be the only one in the office who knew about that relationship. People miss a lot of obvious details that are right in front of them, she thought ruefully. When the door closed behind Oscar a minute later, Jim stretched himself out of his seat and came over to her desk.

 “Tough day?”

“Not too bad. Better than yours, I’m guessing” she said gently, not wanted to force him if he wasn’t ready to talk about it.

“That obvious?”Pam just nodded and looked at him expectantly.

“It’s kind of a long story. Is that rain check for coffee still valid?”

She nodded again, a little too vigorously and hoped the blush wasn’t as noticeable as it felt.  They sat down at a little table near the back, Pam with her chai latte and Jim with his coffee regular. “So.” she prodded lightly.

“So?”

“So you seem kind of upset. Do you want to talk about it?”

NO! Yes, of course. Only if it ends up differently than last time “Um, well, Karen and I broke up. Last night, actually. So…yeah.”

Pam did her best to squelch the giddy feeling that was making her stomach swirl and her arms tingle. Seeing the genuine regret on Jim’s face certainly did the trick. “Oh. Jim, I’m really sorry. You guys really seemed to like each other.”

“Yeah, well, not...” Jim glanced at Pam quickly “Not enough, I guess.”

Pam felt the blush threatening again and decided to lighten the mood. “Hey, well, this might be totally inappropriate right now, but, um, I got you something and I didn’t give it to you last week cause I…don’t know why, but here it is.” She pulled the water bottle, adorned with a red and white polka dot bow out of her bag and set it on the table in front of him.

“Oh, hey, a water bottle. Cool, thanks.” Jim managed a genuine smile for the first time that day.

“But wait, there’s more. Bonus gifts!” Pam said as she gleefully twisted off the top.

“Bonus gifts? Beesly, what in the world?”

“Just some random stuff I collected while you were gone.” Pam clapped in delight as his smile widened.

“Chocolate yogurt? Gross.”

“Now you tell me.”As Pam relayed all of the anecdotes she had been saving up for Jim and he laughed along with her, he began to visibly relax. They both reached for a jelly bean at the same time and when their hands brushed, he didn’t automatically pull back the way he would have before.

“I guess I missed a lot while I was gone.”

“You were missed a lot while you were gone”

“Really?” Jim asked with a mixture of disbelief and hope.

“Really.” Pam said, meeting his questioning gaze with a completely serious one.

“Who would you say missed me the most? Now, I know Michael is the obvious answer because we are after all  BFF. But I think Dwight secretly cried a little every time he sat down at his desk and all of his belongings were in place. Oh, no, wait, I got it – Kevin missed me the most, right?” He waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

Pam impulsively grabbed his hand.“No, Jim. I missed you the most. Definitely me.” Jim stopped grinning and just starred at her. The warmth of his hand filled her with a reckless confidence. Pam took a breath and continued. “I’m sorry if this is weird for you to hear…probably not good timing I know…” Jim’s face went from pale to red and back again, and Pam’s voice started to shake “but I just need you to know, once, that…I am in love with you.”

His words had echoed constantly in her mind these past few months, but she never intended to repeat them back. But when Pam felt her window of opportunity finally crack open, they came pouring out before she could think of anything else. Jim swallowed hard and stared at her as she rushed on. “I’m so sorry I didn’t call you over the summer. I was kind of a mess and after what I said I didn’t know if you’d ever want to hear from me again. And it’s been so, so great to have you back in Scranton, and I had figured…I mean I knew what I felt for you but then you were dating someone else so I didn’t think I could say anything and I can’t imagine what you must have felt all those times when Roy was around and I don’t know how you did it for three years and by the way I’m really, really sorry about what I said that time – you didn’t misinterpret anything.” She paused to catch her breath. “Please tell me I’m not too late.”