"Well this is it." Roy said, holding the door open so Katy could walk inside. He followed her in, leaving Pam to grab the door for herself. Pam just rolled her eyes.

"Oh, it's lovely," Katy was saying as Roy showed her around their small town home.

Pam went straight for the kitchen to dump her purse and jacket on the table. By the time she caught up to them again Roy was showing Katy the guest room.

"And seriously, you can stay here for as long as you need to. We'll help you get back to wherever it is, okay? You don't have to worry."

"Uh, Roy," Pam interrupted. "Can I talk to you for a second?"

"Yeah. What?"

"I mean, in our room," Pam said, her tone clearly implying that this would not be a casual chat.

"Oh."

They both looked over at Katy, who was oblivious. She seemed more interested in the pattern on the curtains than anything Pam was saying.

"We'll be right back. You can just, uh, get settled." Roy said before following Pam down the hall.

Once they were in their bedroom and Roy had shut the door, Pam turned on him.

"What are you doing? You can't just adopt a person, Roy!"

"I'm not adopting her, I'm just letting her stay here for awhile."

"Well, were you even gonna ask me about it?"

"About what?"

"This is my house too!"

"Pam, cut it out. I'm not gonna kick her out on the street."

"Well, I'm not going to either, but you could've asked me first."

"I just figured you'd be okay with it. And you are, so it's fine, right?"

"No!" Pam shouted.

"Pam would you keep it down? She's gonna hear you."

"So what? It's not like she even knows what we're talking about," Pam was feeling unusually angry. It had been a long day and the fact that Roy was trying to pretend like everything was fine only aggravated her more.

"Stop it," Roy said firmly. "She's not stupid, okay? She's just confused. And really sweet, and innocent..."

Pam made a little choking noise of disbelief.

"What?" Roy asked, noticing the look on her face.

"Okay, that's it. If she's staying here, and you're talking about her like that, then I'm leaving." Pam opened her top dresser drawer and began tossing things onto their bed. She'd threatened to leave a few times before over the course of their relationship, but this time she was serious. There was no way she was going to stick around and watch Roy fall in love with another woman.

"What? No. Pammy, you're being ridiculous. Stop. You're totally overreacting here."

"I'm overreacting? You only met her this morning and you're already acting like... like you're in love with her or something."

"I am not. You're just jealous."

Personally Pam felt like she had every reason to be jealous, but she didn't say that, instead she just kept grabbing her clothes from the dresser and throwing them on their bed.

"Pam, stop. You know I love you." Roy came up behind her put his arms around her. For a second she tried to push him away, but he held her arms still until she stopped resisting. Maybe she was overreacting. "Just get a grip, okay?" Roy soothed. "It's only for a couple of days."

"Fine. But as long as she's here, you sleep on the couch."

"Whatever. Just try to be nice to her, will ya? I think all she needs is some good friends to take care of her." Roy gave her a final squeeze and then walked toward the bedroom door.

"What she needs is to get back to the psych ward," Pam muttered, not quite under her breath.

Roy just looked at her.

Finally Pam raised her eyebrows defiantly. "I said she could she stay. I didn't say I'd be nice."

"Whatever. I'm gonna go make dinner."

"You're making her dinner?" Pam asked, incredulously.

"I'm making us dinner. But if you don't want to be around her you can feel free to just stay in here all night."

"Yeah right." Pam replied after he'd left. There was no way she was leaving Roy all alone out there with her. With a glance at the open door she walked into her bathroom and grabbed her lip gloss out of her top drawer. She rarely used it, but somehow having Katy around made her feel... not inferior, but just... she just felt like it might not hurt to make a little bit more of an effort than usual.

***

"So what do you like to do Katy? Like, do you have any hobbies, or... ?" Roy trailed off. They'd finished eating, but they were still sitting around the table, no one really willing to get up and do the dishes quite yet.

"Oh, well... I like to sing." Katy began demurely, "And I often dance at balls, and I enjoy sewing, and baking goodies for all my little friends. They're so kind to me, you know. I do miss them," she finished with a sigh.

Pam thought this might be a good chance to get Katy to tell them the real story of her appearance that morning.

"I'm sure they miss you too. But maybe if you told us a little bit more about where you came from we could help you get back there."

"Oh, I don't know. My father will be very angry with me."

"Well, at least try to remember how you got into that manhole."

"Oh, I know perfectly well how I got there."

"Really?" Roy asked.

"Of course. Everyone in Ciridon knows about the magic portal in the well. That's why it's off-limits. But the soldiers who normally guard it were busy with preparations for my wedding. I only had to distract the others for a minute or two, and my friends were more than willing to help. They knew I couldn't go through with it, no matter what my father said."

"So... you jumped in a well?" Pam asked.

"Yes."

"And ended up in the sewer in Scranton?"

"I suppose so, yes."

"Okay." Pam replied, trying, but not trying very hard to keep the disbelief out of her tone.

"Why would you do that?"

"Perhaps I should go back to the beginning of the story."

"I think that might be best," Roy said with encouraging smile.

"Well, my father is the King of Ciridon and long ago he made a pact with the queen of Malenker, the neighboring kingdom, so that the two kingdoms would one day join together so there could be peace in our lands." Katy kept talking in that sing-song voice of hers that made Pam wonder if she was just reciting something she'd learned by heart. The story made no sense. It was like something straight out of a fairytale, though it wasn't one Pam had ever heard before.

"I'd never even met my betrothed, Prince Jim," Katy was saying.

"Wait, what?"

"Pam, don't interrupt, okay?" Roy chastised. "Just let her finish her story."

Pam's eyes went wide again, but she was done arguing with Roy for the night. If he wanted to pretend like there was anything even remotely normal about Katy that was his problem. In the meantime, her problem was trying to figure out exactly how to extricate Katy from their lives so that everything could just go back to normal.