She did not come meet him. It wasn't feasible. This was a work day after all.

She did, though, duck into a quiet corner of the office and hear him out. At first he scared her a bit. He spoke with a frantic, almost panicky pace. He jumbled his words. He would have sounded lost, confused, but there was a determination in his words that she hadn't heard from him since, well since never.

She waited to speak until he finally went silent.

"Look, Jim, I know you think you're about to make a huge mistake... I'm sure it feels that way. But if you called me hoping I'd talk you out of it, it's not going to happen. I'm so proud of you. Your father will be too when I tell him. Call me if you need anything. Anything at all. I love you, Jim."

********************

So much for that. Strong words of caution from his mother would have probably been the only thing that could have allowed him to turn back with a clear conscience. His mother, as he suspected she would, had welcomed his plan. For a man who had over the last twenty years of his life found the strength to make exactly one truly bold action, this was scary as all hell.

Pretend you're a good man, act like a good man and just keep pretending, and before you know it, you'll be a good man...

Jim couldn't help but laugh at the latest words running through his cluttered head. They had been spoken by his television about a month ago at around 2AM, when he and Karen, both more than a little drunk, had flipped through the channels and stopped on a cable reality show about Hawaii's most colorful bail-bondsman/bounty-hunter. Dog. Dog Chapman-- the convict turned leather-clad, mullet-wearing, post- apocalyptic epitome of modern day redemption. Jim and Karen had been unable to go more than thirty seconds between fits of ironic laughter as they watched Dog and his crew hunt down two-bit criminals, and better yet, try to bring them to Jesus during the car ride to the police-station. It was during one such post-arrest lecture that Dog had spoken those words to some small time crack dealer. Jim and Karen had laughed. Now it suddenly wasn't so funny to Jim.

Jim fetched a pen and notepad from his glove compartment. Nearing 30 years old, Jim was among the last generation of American schoolchildren who learned cursive writing before he learned to type. He never used it anymore, but he broke it out as he purposefully scrawled out a note.

Dear Karen,

I am writing this now because I have no idea what the future holds for us and there are some things that I want to tell you regardless of where you and I end up. Please believe me that I never intended to hurt you the way I did. I was unfair and misleading and I can say nothing to defend my actions. It is well within your rights to never forgive me. The fact is I know I will have a very difficult time forgiving myself. But know this: I will not let this consume me. I will work to redeem myself-- If not in your eyes then in the eyes of everyone I know from this day onward. I swear to you I will be a better man for having wronged you. I swear your pain will not be meaningless.

Love Always, Jim

That would do. Karen deserved to read those words. Her capacity to forgive would surely be tested in the hours and days to come. In the event that she chose to turn away from Jim completely, she may someday appreciate what he had written.

And the time was upon him. It was nearly 3PM by now. Jim had been sitting in his car for hours. There were several difficult conversations he still had to have. Of these, one could not wait. The most important, most difficult one.

****************

"Pam. Can you duck out of the office, I'll pick you up... I'm OK, but I really need to talk to you... OK see you soon."

He could hear the worry in her voice. He had no doubt left an impression this morning with his weird behavior. In the past he would have spent the short drive over to pick her up rehearsing what he was going to say during their impending talk, but this time he simply relaxed and cleared his mind. Whatever needed to happen would happen.

He pulled up, and she approached his car and opened the passenger door before he had even stopped. She purposefully ducked inside and looked intently at him as she buckled her seat belt. Jim looked back at her as he turned out of the parking lot. He didn't know where to go, so he just drove. Pam spoke first.

"Jim, what's wrong? Is everything OK?"

Tread carefully, but be nothing but honest.

"I knew she loved me, Pam. I just wouldn't admit it. And then I treated her like she was nothing and I didn't even have a second thought about it."

Pam seemed a little miffed. She seemed to be answering reactively. This was definitely an awkward subject considering tumult of the past week.

"It'll be all right, Jim. I know you wouldn't have..."

Despite his new dedication to honesty, Jim was somewhat happy that his steering duties kept him from making anything but sporadic eye contact as he continued speaking.

"Did you see her today? Nobody will even talk to her because they're too embarrassed after seeing what they saw. I'm not proud..."

She cut him off. Her voice was loud, defensive.

"Of course I saw it Jim, and it does bother me and I totally want to go tell her I'm sorry for everything but I know there's no way she'd believe me. Are looking for a way to back out of this?"

Just tell her everything. Let her decide.

"It's not like that, Pam, but please just let me finish. You know I love you and I've loved you for years. When I started here I didn't care about anything at all. The job was boring as all hell, I wasn't passionate about anything. There was nothing. I cared about nothing..."

She was leaning across the seat now, her hand on his thigh, her face heavy with concern as she hung on his words.

"But then I met you, and then I started caring about one thing. Just one thing, and nothing else. For all those years all I cared about was you and that was enough for me. Even though you were with Roy, you were all I wanted, all I needed. But all those years of caring about nothing but you made me so numb and so weak..."

She opened her mouth to speak but her cut her off, raising his voice as he continued to keep his thoughts flowing.

"So weak that after all of this, after six months with Karen, when push came to shove, I treated her like she was trash and I felt nothing doing it, because at the end of the day you were still the only thing I really cared about..."

Watch her now. See how she takes your next words...

"And you have to believe me, you're everything I ever wanted, but the line between caring about nothing at all and caring about nothing but you is one I can't tiptoe around any more. I need more, Pam... I need to feel some of that middle ground between nothing and madly in love . I need to feel alive, and believe me, I don't want to lose you, but there's something I have to do..."

Her voice was softer than he expected. "What Jim... What do you have to do?"

"First I have to do right by Karen, if that's even possible. I don't know what that will take but I have to do what I can. You and I need to slow down a bit, give things a little time to settle. It's awkward and it's complicated but its my fault and I have to deal with it. But this isn't really about Karen. It's about me... I'm leaving Dunder Mifflin. That job makes me so callous and so bored that I become capable of doing things... things I have a hard time living down. I didn't used to be this way, Pam. I want to feel passion. I want to have opinions. I want to be strong, to be a man. And I want to feel like I'm doing something with my life other than living one big soap opera."

Pam started asking the obvious question but Jim was ready for her.

"Scranton if possible, but most likely Philly. Not too far. A year or two to finish my degree and then maybe grad school for a teaching credential. Some volunteer work on the side... maybe coach a little basketball."

He didn't know what she'd say, but he was surprised.

"I'm proud of you, Jim. Please just remember to save a little time for madly-in-love with me." In his peripheral vision, he could feel her beaming as she spoke. "Besides, what I want isn't behind that stupid desk... it's sitting right here. You could move to Detroit for all I care and I'd find a way to get there."

"Detroit?"

"Yeah, Detroit."

Wow. Detroit. Action was needed that couldn't safely transpire in a moving vehicle. Time to pull over.