Jim thumped his head against the wall when he leaned back on his couch. He needed to move that particular piece of furniture; he’d figured that out in late May when he first moved into his new place in Stamford. It was now August.

He liked it here, he did. It was nice and he got some gorgeous views of the ocean and it wasn’t there.

He didn’t like the Stamford office so much. The people were quiet and kept to themselves - for the most part - and he hated that. He hated it more that he missed the noise of the Scranton office.

But at least Dwight had called him Jim.

A sigh escaped him when he heard his phone ring to inform him he had a voicemail waiting. He picked up his phone and saw he had missed a call from the same number again. It was the fourth time she’d called and the fourth time he missed it.

He wasn’t ignoring her, he just never reached his phone in time. He didn’t have the strength to come up with an excuse as to why he hadn’t called her back.

He picked up his phone to listen to her message. Which, if it followed the pattern of the other three, would be nothing.

One new message…“Um, Jim, it’s me. Pam. I, hmm, I should have left a message before. Like the first fifty times I called, but, well, I didn’t.” There was a sigh heard and a short pause. “Maybe we could talk soon? I just…I miss you. I miss my friend. My best friend. And it’d be really great if we could talk. About anything, anything you want. Just, yeah. You can call me back or I can just leave another awkward message, I’ll leave that up to you…” To save, press 7. To delete, press 9.

He immediately pressed seven before he could think about it. He thought: she shot me down, and then: she’s reaching out. His heart hurt when he listened to the message again, but he ached to talk to her.

That voicemail was all he needed. He called back as soon as he could the next day.

As luck would have it, she didn’t answer. He chose to believe she couldn’t reach her phone and he left her a message.

“Hey Pam, it’s me. Jim. I, uh, okay, I had something to say, something awesome, obviously, and now…Well, I guess all I can say is that I heard you needed a friend and I’m calling. But hey, don’t call me back Beesly, I owe you three more phone calls and voicemails. So, if we’re patient, we’ll actually talk in, oh, four days? Uh, yeah. Okay, bye.”

The next night, he wasn’t paying attention when his phone rang and he picked it up without looking to see who was calling.

Her voice when he picked up the phone was just melodic, he’d never heard anything more beautiful.

He forgot to chastise her for calling him.

For their first two phone conversations, Pam stuck to her word and wouldn’t speak until Jim came up with a subject. As much as it frustrated him to have to continually come up with something to talk about, it couldn’t have made him happier to have her doing what she could to gain her friend back, even if she already had him.

At the end of each call though, she made it a point to let him know how much she missed him. She wouldn’t always just come out and say it, but she made it clear. It made him yearn to see her again.

She seemed to have felt it too because she started to constantly remind him that she’d be free for a full weekend towards the end of September.

Phyllis seemed to have known as well because, for what seemed like an inexplicable reason to him, she sent him an e-mail with directions from the Stamford office to Pam’s new apartment.

He may be a guy, but he never thought he was that slow on the uptake.

He figured that he'd show up early Saturday morning instead of Friday night.

When that particular weekend came, he hadn’t been able to reach Pam on Friday night, but he didn’t worry. It wasn’t really unusual, she always forgot to charge her phone.

By eight o’clock that evening, he wondered if she was mad that he didn’t show up on her doorstep. He grew annoyed for a moment, why should he be expected to go out of his way to please her?

He wondered when he grew into a prick a moment later.

At 9:18, he wondered who was knocking on his door.

There was no greeting as Pam launched herself into his arms when he opened his door. His mind went blank for a moment while his arms hugged her back.

I guess she isn’t mad at me, Jim thought to himself.

“You ruined my surprise,” he whispered softly in her ear. “I planned on knocking on your door at 8AM tomorrow morning.” She pulled back, keeping a firm grip on his shoulders and smiled up at him.

“I knew you’d want to surprise me if you came back to Scranton, so I took a chance to surprise you first. It’s sort of my turn, right?” She didn’t even try and look him in the face as she said it.

He tilted his head to the side, wanting to tell her it didn‘t matter. But he can’t get any words past his grin.

And he still wanted to smack his head on the wall for being annoyed earlier.

She let go of him and sort of skipped around his living room, gracing him with a smile that put her joy on Casino Night - well, the first half of that night, at least - to shame.

It was a good night.