We Will Become Silhouettes

The morning sun filtered through the closed drapes, despite the fact that they appeared dark and heavy enough to keep out the Spanish Inquisition. Soft chords and upbeat voices drifted in and out of Pam’s unconscious, interrupting the cool emptiness where she escaped every night in her dreamless sleep. It was only there that she felt comfort, and here some foreign melody was invading her happy place. She silently willed it to go away, but as the song ended and a man began announcing the morning traffic report, she realized the threat was in fact just the alarm clock. She groaned in frustration and defeat, rolling over to her side and slamming her palm down on the snooze button. The red digits glowed 7:34 AM mockingly, and Pam briefly entertained the notion of throwing it against the wall.

It wasn’t that she wasn’t a morning person. She usually loved waking up early and putting on a favorite CD while she got ready for work. Sometimes she even set her alarm early in order to have time to work on a sketch or painting. And if it had been any other day, she would have jumped up when the song came on, turned the dial up to the maximum volume, and opened the hunter green drapes to welcome the warm, sun-kissed spring morning. But today wasn’t like any other day. And she dreaded going to work, where she knew it could – and would, knowing her luck – only get worse.

She sighed heavily with the weight of the world on her shoulders, and trudged over to her small closet in her equally small room of a cramped apartment. She scanned the numerous cardigans and pressed skirts and button-up blouses. They all looked as drab and gray and monotonous as she felt inside. Glancing down, she saw the sensible white tennis shoes she got the Dundee award for last year, but she quickly looked away to her other shoes. Those shoes brought up the memory of a friendship she no longer had, and of the lips she knew she would never feel upon hers again.

She stood there, still as a statue in front of her open closet. The bird chirping outside her window was the only sound, and the cars whizzing past in the street below was the only movement. She wasn’t sure how long she stood there, but she knew she was going to be late if she continued to let indecisiveness and apathy rule her day. God, I’m not even at work yet and I’m wishing this day was over. She thought to herself as she randomly grabbed a white blouse, navy cardigan and khaki skirt.

Just as she was tugging off her plaid pajamas, she realized that Michael had brought back Casual Fridays. Usually this wouldn’t affect her since she continued to wear her work clothes anyway, but she couldn’t for the life of her put on the things she picked out. She was so very tired of wearing a mask every day; of acting as if she wasn’t miserable and lonely and fed-up. She was fucking sick of everyone around her acting as if she didn’t exist; as if she was a part of the wallpaper of the office. She wondered how long her co-workers have treated her like this, or if they always have but she was only now noticing it. If it was just more pronounced and obvious now that she didn’t have a best friend... now that he treated her exactly like all the others.

She fought back the familiar sting behind her eyes as she angrily threw her clothes back into the closet, where they lay haphazardly on the floor of the otherwise-impeccable space. She debated whether or not to just call out sick, but the pile of unpaid bills staked on her kitchen table would taunt her all day. So she took a deep breath, trying to cleanse her aura or whatever those new-age gurus babble about, and forced a smile upon her face. It felt strange and contrived, seeing as it had been so long since she had genuinely smiled. She felt her thoughts drift back to memories of Jim as they always seemed to do these days, but she willed herself to not go there. Besides, he never stopped smiling. Only someone else smiled with him now.

The anger and resentment churned its way up, and she welcomed it. It was better than the heavy, overwhelming sadness she was used to anyway. Anger gave her a surge of energy; a sort of motivation to quit drowning in silence while everyone else continued sitting dry and warm in the boat. It gave her a will to push herself against the current and kick and scream to be noticed; to splash the water on everyone so they were all equal.

She marched with purpose over to the window and forcefully separated the drapes with a satisfying swish. Then she turned on her stereo and hit play, taking a chance on whether or not a CD of melancholy music from her more depressed nights was left in. She was pleasantly surprised to hear the guitar riffs of "Last Nite" from The Strokes fill her room and make its way into her soul.

She then headed back to her closet, only this time more determined.

*

Pulling into the parking lot of Dunder-Mifflin, Pam Beesly felt like a new breed of human. She wasn’t quite sure what had gotten into her, but she liked it. She liked it a lot. She even briefly entertained the idea of making everyone address her as ‘Pamela’ from then on, but she didn’t want others to think she had suddenly developed a split personality. She laughed to herself at that thought as she killed the engine and stepped out of the car. Suddenly she felt nervous and more than a bit foolish, but she pushed it down and forced herself to walk towards the entrance with her head held high. It was too late to go home now, and besides, she needed to do this.

 She took the stairs instead of the elevator because of all the pent-up energy and nervousness that was churning in her stomach. As she reached the office floor and walked down the hallway, she heard the elevator ding and laughter coming from the people who were walking out. Pam stopped short and caught none other than Jim holding the door open for Karen, a huge grin on his face. Karen teasingly smacked his chest while laughing heartily at whatever he had just said. Pam watched as they made their way past the empty receptionist desk without a glance and disappeared out of sight.

If she had any doubts before, she sure as hell didn’t have them now. It was past nine AM, which not only meant that they were late coming from whatever they had been doing together this morning, but that they didn’t think twice about where she might be. Pushing the anger and hurt down, she decided to instead use it as fuel to make it through the day.

Taking one last cleansing breath, she forced herself to retreat from her safe hiding spot behind the fake tree in the hallway corner and walk inside. She gracefully maneuvered her way behind her desk, looking straight ahead and without breaking stride. It was only after getting comfortable in her chair and turning on her computer did she allow herself to look up.

Glancing casually around the room, she saw that everyone was engrossed in whatever work they were required to do. Part of her felt relieved that no attention had been called to her appearance or tardiness, but a bigger part felt frustrated. She sighed in defeat and pulled out her sketchbook from her messenger bag.

The very second she put the pencil to the paper, Michael burst out of his office with his usual over-excitement and childlike enthusiasm. Immediately, Dwight stood up from his desk and rushed over to stand by his side.

"Attention, everyone!" Michael announced to the office, but no one lifted their eyes from their tasks.

"Everyone, attention!" Dwight repeated, but with more force than Michael.

Everyone continued to ignore them while the hum of the office computers filled the silence.

"Dwight, go back to your seat, I can handle this." Michael scolded, no doubt blaming everyone’s disinterest on Dwight and not him.

"I would just like to announce that I had a conversation with Jan just now--"

"–About that thing in bed she wants you to try but you’re too embarrassed--"

"God, no, Dwight!" Michael whined in annoyance, and Pam caught Jim giving the camera one of his trademark looks.

"An-y-way... Like I was saying, I had a conversation with Jan and she informed me that Dunder-Mifflin Scranton will be accepting two transfers from the Albany branch and--"

"But I am still the Assistant Regional Manager, correct?" Dwight interrupted, somewhat nervously but still in his usual militant voice.

Michael sighed and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Do we really have to go over this again?"

"Do you need me to do a background check on these new applicants to determine if they are potential threats?"

"No, that won’t be necessary Dwight. And they’re already hired."

Dwight ignored Michael and rushed over to his computer. "What are their names?"

"Dwight..."

"Michael."

"I promised Jan I wouldn’t..."

Pause.

"Kate Lisbon and Dominic Rossi." Michael quietly answered while guiltily avoiding the camera.

He strode over to where Dwight was sitting and peered over his shoulder curiously. A few seconds of silence stretched out as Dwight typed with the zealousness of an important CIA mission.

"Fact." His voice boomed suddenly, causing a few otherwise-uninterested co-workers to lift their heads. "Kate Lisbon has had no prior arrests or speeding tickets, and there are no alerts for outstanding warrants..."

"...Well, she wouldn’t have an outstanding warrant if she’s never had a ticket or been arrested before." Jim remarked casually, and Pam felt butterflies in her stomach at the sound of his voice.

"No, what I mean is – I just worded it wrong." Dwight brushed off Jim and glanced back up at Michael. "She doesn’t appear to be a threat."

"Good, good." Michael distractedly commented.

"But how do you know for sure she’s not a threat? That information could be false." Jim countered.

"This is a highly-advanced program. I don’t expect someone like you Jim to understand."

"All I’m saying is she’s could be an undercover rogue agent... and then all that information could be forged." Jim said in a mock-serious tone while leaning in closer to Dwight as if they were still an alliance.

Dwight paused, looking off into the distance as if appearing to give it serious thought. "Well, I suppose I could find out by--" Suddenly he turned towards Jim and glared. "Wait. You’re mocking me."

Jim shot an amused smile towards Karen, who smiled back in response.

"Hey Pam..." Michael began, his eyes still on Dwight’s computer screen. "Could you take notes of how the new transfers fit in around here?"

Pam glanced up from her sketchbook and was about to open her mouth when Michael glanced up at her.

"Whoa-oh-oh! Pam-a-lama ding-dong! Why don’t you come to work like that every day? Would make these days with Dwight more bearable!"

Dwight continued typing. "I resent that."

Suddenly it felt like every single pair of eyes in the office were fixed on her. She felt the urge to shrink back and silently cursed Michael for drawing attention to her. But wait, wasn’t that what she wanted in the first place?

"It’s – I thought – I mean, It’s Casual Friday." She stammered meekly, feeling her cheeks slightly burn up.

"Well Pam, I’ll make every day Casual Friday if you promise to look like that!" He laughed to himself.

"But wait... wouldn’t that make it ‘Casual Monday,’ ‘Casual Tuesday,’ ‘Casual Wednes-’"

"I get it Dwight, god! Always ruining a good joke." And then he slunk back into his office and closed the door, but not before Pam caught him peering at her behind the blinds.

Pam sighed wearily and caught Kelly’s eye, who was jumping up and down in her seat with a giddy smile plastered on her face and a thumbs-up sign in the air. She smiled back warmly before glancing at Jim. Or rather, the back of Jim’s neck.

She played with a strand of hair she had straightened while looking down at herself. She had decided to wear a light blue Arctic Monkeys vintage tee shirt with low-rise dark skinny jeans and converses. She had received the shirt as a gift from a friend who had went to a concert, knowing how much Pam likes the band. Truth is, Pam got into the band after listening to them a few times on Jim’s iPod. They were just one of the bands that reminded her so much of him, thus one of the bands she usually avoided listening to lately.

She had the converses back from her teenage years when she was "Ms. Artsy-Fartsy," as Roy used to call her. She loved them, but never wore them since Roy didn’t like that whole style. So they sat in the back of her closet for years, and now wearing them for the first time since 11th grade, the freedom the break-up with Roy provided hit her. And she smiled into her drawings.

That smile quickly faded though when she caught a glimpse of her calender, and she was reminded why it was so difficult to get up this morning and face what today was. The date was circled, and what was written in her small scribbled handwriting brought her back to the harshness of reality: Today was her birthday.