Disclaimer: I don’t own anything.

Warnings: Some language, sex, and violence

“I get it now. We’re never actually going to leave this apartment.” He sighed deeply and then flopped across the bed, splaying out his limbs like a rag doll.

“Get a hold of yourself, Halpert,” she scolded, stuffing a sweatshirt into her suitcase. “We can’t just rush off ill-provisioned on a quest this humongous and spectacular! The consequences could be dire!”

“Dire?” he groaned.

“Dire!” she confirmed. “Now move, you’re lying on my sweater.”

She reached under his stomach and grabbed a bit of purple wool. She tried to tug it from beneath his limp form as he just lay there flashing an amused grin.

“Having problems with your wardrobe, Beesly?”

“For Christ’s sake, Jim!” she screeched at him finally, laughing despite herself. “Go warm up the car and I’ll be down in a second… I promise.” She added the last part after he hunched an eyebrow.

“Yes’m.” He jumped up happily, kissing her cheek and taking her suitcase with him as he made for the front door.

They were minutes away from lift off of the inaugural Beesly and Halpert’s Traveling All-Star Extravaganzium and Motor Show… Gigante! And both of them were practically humming with nervous energy. They were going to visit their families, hers then his. And at both stops the new couple expected to be thoroughly examined and critiqued, perhaps even made to stand in the living room while assorted cousins, aunts, and uncles slowly shuffled by and gave their opinions.

Pam felt her cheeks warm as she recalled talking to his mom on the phone. “Now let me tell you, Pam,” Susie Halpert had begun. “Because I doubt Jim did. But I have spent the past twenty-eight years cooking for four individuals of wildly different tastes. And I’m prepared to call on all that culinary expertise to fix you whatever you want to eat.”

“Oh, don’t worry about me, Mrs. Hal- I mean Susie. I’m sure whatever you make will be delicious.”

There was a familiar sounding sigh from the other end of the line. “Listen, Sweetie, you’ve made my Jimmy happy, and the very least I can do is make sure there’s something here you like to munch on.”

Pam beamed into the phone. “Well how about soft-shell crab, twice-baked potatoes, and pecan pie?” She rattled off some of “Jimmy’s” favorites.

Susie Halpert had laughed then. “Alright, Sweetie, if that’s the way you want to play it. I do have extensive experience with those dishes and they will be hot and tasty when you kids get here.”

In the frost coated Yaris Jim sat in the passenger seat trying to coax more heat from the engine. He hated driving long distances all bundled up, and had bounded down the stairs in just his red Sixers hoody.

“Come on, Pam,” he muttered. “I’m freezing my nuts off here.” He reached for the horn.

Dunnnnh Dunh Dunh Dunh Duh Dunnnh Dunnnh Dunnnh

“I’m coming!” She called, locking the door. They grinned dopily at each other as she skipped down the stairs.

“How come I’m driving first?”

“Because you got top billing of the Traveling All-Star Extraviganzium and Motor Show…” They both waited a beat and then exclaimed, “Gigante!”

“How come you didn’t put on the back defrogger?”

“Because I couldn’t find it… Wait; did you just call it the Defrogger?”

“How could you not find it? It’s right here underneath the hazard lights.”

“Beesly…”

“Okay, okay, jeez…When I was real little, like barely talking, I used to call it the defrogger and--- Hey! Don’t laugh at me!”

“I’m sorry.” he choked out.

“No you’re not.” She narrowed her eyes at him. “Didn’t you do anything like that when you were tiny?”

“Oh no, I was a very well-spoken child, eloquent you might say.”

“Liar… I’m going to ask Susie all about you, Jimmy Halpert.”

He shuddered and glanced over his shoulder at the back seat. They’d packed for a six day trip like they’d be gone for a month. There were two suitcases and three duffel bags between them, four bags of sun chips, a case of grape soda, three kinds of snack cakes, a six-pack of tall-boys in a cooler, a bottle of wine, a portable DVD player they went halves on, a couple seasons each of Venture Brothers and Its Always Sunny, a handful of their favorite books, their laptops, and various presents for relevant family members.

“You do realize we’re going to get like five miles to the gallon loaded down like this?”

“What did I tell you about the consequences?”

“That they’d be dire.”

“I’m glad you’re finally starting to pay attention, Halpert.” She reached over and patted his cheek. He covered her hand with his own and brought it to his mouth, kissing her palm, wrist, fingers. She pulled on to the Interstate and they hit a small bump.

“I think you just ran over the defrogger.”

Darkness found them at a highway motel stripped down to T-shirts and underwear, killing the bottle of wine and watching Mac try to bang Dennis’s Mom.

“Would you ever try to bang my mom?”

“Well if she’s half as fine as you I won’t be making any promises.”

She proceeded to beat him mercilessly with a pillow. Which led to wrestling then tickling then fondling then kissing and so on and so forth until later they lay curled together feeling sleepy and dazed and quite proud of themselves.

“I’ll have you know my mom would never do that.”

“Dear God, I hope not. I wouldn’t be able to look the woman in the eye.”

He felt her smile against his chest. “Everybody’s going to love you, Jim.”

“What if they don’t?”

“I’ll bludgeon them with something harder than a pillow until they do.”

“Of course.”

She shifted and brought her face up level with his. “What about your family? Are they gonna love me?”

“Are you kidding? At this point I think my mom would be just as happy to adopt you and send me off to the orphanarium.”

“Aww, don’t worry little orphan Jimmy, I’ll come and adopt you.” She nibbled gently on his neck. “You know how to mine coal, right?”

“Very funny, Beesly, it’s illegal to make orphans mine coal these days.”

“Well I’ll find some use for you.”

They played for a while, teasing and laughing, trading hickeys on sensitive places. And she talked to him in her sweet secret language made of mews and whimpers and soft little bird sounds. It was a language he was just beginning to understand but wanted desperately to master.

They came at nearly the same moment and then he pulled her close, fitting her body to his before he fell asleep with an arm around her middle and his breath grazing her neck.

She lay awake for a little while smiling into the dark, soaking up all the body heat and love, trying to get a handle on the pure joy that seemed to be radiating from her heart.

“I love him,” she whispered to the dark. She let her eyes close. And she dreamt of fireplaces and Christmas trees. She dreamt of children laughing and his heartbeat pressed against her back.

In the morning while they showered in the tiny bathtub she reached up and felt his stubble. “Let me shave you.”

“Excuse me?”

“You always miss this swath right here on your neck and I’m afraid it’s driving me a little crazy.”

“My beard grows at a weird angle right there.”

“Don’t make excuses, Halpert! Just lather up and get me your razor.”

And he looked at her standing there all grinning and wet and naked and found he couldn’t say no.

“I haven’t pissed you off have I? Please don’t cut me.”

“How can you be such a sloppy shaver with all these blades? What’s this little button do? Oh holy crap it vibrates! Why in the world would you need a vibrating razor?”

“That’s space age technology, Beesly! Astronauts are using that to shave themselves in zero gravity as we speak!” He trailed his fingers down her slick tummy to her damp curls. “And I’ll have to show you the benefits of a vibrating razor.” He slipped two fingers inside her, making her shiver and rise up on her toes.

“Unless you want your face to look like a depressed teenage girl I’d quit being a distraction.”

He watched her eyebrows furrow in deep concentration, her tongue stuck in the corner of her mouth as she carefully pulled the razor across his skin. And he felt love and desire come bubbling up from somewhere deep inside.

“Like a baby’s bottom.” She rubbed his smooth cheeks.

He grabbed her by the waist and turned her around, pressing her chest against the warm tile and pulling her bottom against him. She gasped and looked back at him over her shoulder. He saw the surprise in her eyes change to want and surrender.

When they finally emerged from the shower their fingers were pruney and she couldn’t meet his eyes without breaking into a shy grin.

“Ravished,” she said finally as they were pulling out of the motel parking lot. She was plowing through a bag of French onion sunchips.

“Excuse me?”

“I’ve been trying to think of a word to describe what you did to me in the shower and the best one I can think of is ‘ravished’. You ravished me.”

“I like it. Jim Halpert, ravisher of women. It’s got a definite ring.”

“Except the women part.”

“Okay, Jim Halpert ravisher of one especially beautiful and talented woman.”

“Much better.”

“I hope you’ll let me practice my ravishing later tonight.”

“For shame, Halpert! In my parents’ house!”

“We’ll just be discreet.”

“I don’t think I can be discreet with you.”

“Good thing I got us matching ball gags for Christmas.”

“Oh, what color did you get me?”

“Ravishing red, of course.”

She was dozing later when he pulled off the interstate into a gas station. He swiped his debit card and was pumping gas when the maroon Trans Am pulled up beside the next pump.

“No fucking way.”

The driver door of the Trans Am opened and Dwight unfolded himself. He noticed Jim, seemed to startle and reached inside his jacket, presumably for a pair of nunchuks or other weaponry, before regaining his composure and placing his hand on the roof of his car.

“What are you doing here, Jim?”

“Filling up”

“I meant what are you really doing?”

“Uh, going to visit Pam’s family.”

“A likely story.”

“What about you?”

Dwight chose not to answer, but instead slowly rotated his head, looking at Jim from every corner of his eyes. “What song was Andy singing in the break room last Friday?”

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me, doppelganger!”

Jim blinked. “I believe it was She’s So High Above Me, only he changed the words to ‘Cleopatra, Joan of Ark, and Hermaphrodite’.”

Dwight visibly relaxed.

“So where you headed?”

Dwight straightened a little bit and patted the pockets of his coat. “I’m going to dine with a woman I met on a message board for single Battlestar Galactica fans.”

Jim grimaced. “Sounds like you have a lot in common.”

“She shares my belief that Starbuck, while clearly a gifted pilot and guerilla fighter, is obviously unfit for any sort of command as demonstrated by her insubordinate tendencies and—Why can’t I find my wallet?” He ducked back inside the Trans Am and began rifling through piles of spiral notebooks and McDonalds bags in the front seat.

“Clearly you’re soul mates.”

Dwight stood back up and glared at Jim in frustration. “What has happened to my wallet?”

“I… don’t know, Dwight… I’ve been driving in this car with Pam for the past three hours.” He finished pumping gas and hung up the nozzle.

Dwight continued to glare. “I don’t have time for this, Jim.”

Jim thought for a moment then shrugged his eyebrows. “It’s in a plastic bag floating in your washer fluid tank.”

Dwight shook his head. “So immature.” He popped the hood of his car.

The passenger door of the Yaris opened and Pam emerged with a wide yawn. “Havta go bathroom,” she mumbled.

“I’ll join you.” Jim walked quickly around the car and swept her along with an arm around her shoulders.

“Is that Dwight?”

“Of course not. You, like me, are clearly having a nightmare.”

The sliding doors dinged as they walked into the mini-mart. It was empty except for the gray-haired Indian clerk and a scruffy, snotty looking little guy fidgeting at the ATM. He glanced over at them for a second before wiping his nose and looking down at the credit card in his hand. Jim saw his hollow, red-glazed eyes and remembered a guy he knew in college who one desperate Friday night moved all the furniture out of his room, got on his hands and knees, and combed through his carpet looking for lost particles of cocaine.

Pam went to the restroom while Jim browsed the beer, wondering which her father would appreciate more; a case of Stella Artois or just plain old Budweiser.

“So you’re the guy who changed my daughter’s life?” he’d said to Jim over the phone, in a tone of gratitude and congratulation and just a bit of suspicion that had left him unable to think of anything to say.

He looked up and saw Pam walking towards him past the dairy shelf, her eyelids still heavy with sleep. And then he heard the clerk gasp and a tinny, cracking voice say “Give me the money.”

They turned and saw the terrified clerk, saw the guy from the ATM holding a small, shiny revolver. A soft “Oh” escaped Pam’s mouth just as Jim took a step towards her.

The guy yelped in surprise and spun around, his shaking hand swept the gun over them. “Don’t move!” His eyes were frantic and pleading. He trained the gun back on the clerk, pointing it right at the name plate on his chest. “I said give me the money! Whatever’s in the register!”

Pam and Jim were just a few steps apart. They looked at each other, her eyes went wide and her jaw trembled. He tried to take another step, tried to reach for her.

“I said don’t fucking move!” The guy snarled. He shuffled a few steps towards Jim, leveling the gun at his face.

“Okay,” Jim’s voice barely cracked a whisper. “Okay.”

The guy wiped his nose and a small whining sound came from the back of his throat. His eyes creased with distress and when he pointed the gun back at the clerk his hand was shaking violently. “Give me the money now!”

The clerk stammered something intelligible, then he seemed to slip or stumble against the counter and the whole store filled with this terrible, ear-splitting ringing. The clerk dropped beneath the counter and the guy screamed and fired a shot over his head. Then he whirled around and Pam found herself staring down the barrel of the gun, found herself staring down this bottomless well about to swallow all her dreams of fireplaces and Christmas tress and laughter.

And then something moved in front of her, shielding her, grabbing her arms. Her face pressed into Jim’s chest and she caught a lingering whiff of his shaving cream.

The gun roared and she felt his whole body jerk. Some awful concoction of horror and anguish flooded her veins. There was an explosion next to her and something cold and wet sprayed her face.

She heard another gunshot and then Jim picked her up and slammed her to the ground, knocking the air from her lungs. Over his shoulder she saw two bullets tear through the ceiling tiles.

The harsh ringing died suddenly and she heard Dwight’s hoarse scream. “I said drop the piece scumsucker!”

Jim rolled part way off of her and she saw the robber sprawled face down on the floor, the arm holding the gun pinned by Dwight’s knee. Dwight had him by his greasy hair and was steadily banging his head against the ground. “I said drop it!”

The robber cried out and squeezed off one last shot that splintered the bottom of the restroom door. And it was only then that Pam screamed.