He wasn’t sure where things had gone wrong. All he knew was that something had happened; something had made Pam decide that she couldn’t go home with him even though they were practically at the apartment already.

            He had called her three times on Sunday, and she hadn’t answered the phone. He had gone to her apartment and knocked on the door, and even though he could hear the TV playing in the background, she pretended not to be home. There was a part of him that wanted to knock the door down and make her talk to him, but he knew he had to stay calm or it would make things worse.

            He forced himself to wait until lunchtime to go up to the office. He figured, what the hell? It would be kind of like old times. He wasn’t sure which old times, because he never really visited her at her desk during the day until after they broke up—and that had been a mistake, he got that now. But he was learning from his mistakes. Pam needed to see that.

            “Roy,” she said, and the surprise in her voice just barely distracted him from the fear in her eyes. Why would she look scared to see him?

            “Have lunch with me?” He smiled a little, knowing which smile worked best on getting Pam to go along with whatever he wanted. “Come on, Pammy.”

            She stared down at her desk and shook her head. “Roy. No.”

            He took a deep breath and ran his hands through his hair, glancing around the office to see if anyone had noticed. And, of course, there was fucking Halpert, with those puppy dog eyes that always seemed to be pointed in Pam’s direction. Roy fought back the urge to pull Halpert’s skinny ass out of his chair and punch his stupid enormous nose.

            “Roy, please go away.”

            “You can’t just be like this.” He was trying so hard to keep from yelling that his voice barely came out as a whisper. “You can’t make me think I have a chance with you and then pretend like it never happened.”

            “Nothing did happen.” Pam’s voice wasn’t as quiet as his. Roy noticed that the office had gotten quieter. This was getting embarrassing. “Please go.”

            Out of the corner of his eye, Roy saw Jim shift in his seat. Pam must have noticed too, because she glanced at Jim and shook her head—just a little, but Roy noticed.

            “What’s that, some sort of stupid freaking secret code?” He didn’t feel like keeping his voice down anymore. If she had just gotten up and gone to lunch, none of this would be happening. “Huh, Halpert?”

            Pam didn’t look scared anymore. Now she just looked pissed.

            “Get out. Now.”

            “Do you have something to say to me, Jim?” Roy crossed his arms over his chest and stared down at Halpert. He didn’t look scared either.

            “Jim, stay out of it.” Roy glanced up to see the new girl, the hot one, standing at her desk. “It’s none of your business.”

            But Jim ignored her. He stood up and walked up to Roy.

            “Pam asked you to leave. I think you should just go.”

            “And I think you should listen to your girlfriend and stay the hell out of it.”

            Everyone was staring. Roy tried not to care. Man, he hated this guy.

            “Listen, man. I don’t any trouble—”

            And that’s when Roy punched him.

            Suddenly there was noise everywhere, and Roy couldn’t tell where any of it was coming from. He found himself on top of Halpert, getting ready to throw another punch. He could tell that someone was pulling on his arm, and someone else was grabbing his hair, but he was strong. He didn’t care.

            And then he heard a loud whistle, the kind coaches use to get attention during practice. Roy looked up to see the old guy standing over them.

            “Get the hell up, asshole,” he said. “I just called the cops.”

            Roy stood up, feeling clumsy and stupid. He looked at Pam, trying to figure out how he could apologize for this—how he could make her stop glaring at him. But she just gave him one last look, one last angry look, and he knew that he had screwed up too bad this time. He stumbled to the office door.

            He turned around, just in case. Sometimes girls changed their minds, he knew that. But Pam was holding a Kleenex to Jim’s nose and whispering something in his ear. And—shit, shit, shit—she was crying.

            As the door closed behind him, Roy had a feeling he wouldn’t be coming up to the office again anytime soon.