“Seriously, Pam, it’s August.”
“I don’t care. I’m still freezing.”
“The thermostat’s set at 70.”
She gets up, heads for the hallway. “Are blankets in here? Behind these boxes?” she calls from the closet.
“Um yeah, I think…oh wait, no…” His eyes suddenly go wide and he springs off the couch. “Wait—”
There’s a thud, a yelp of pain and then Jim is there, looking down at his girlfriend under a heap of slim, brightly-colored tomes in plastic sleeves. She looks up at him.
“Booby trapped,” she laughs, scrambling out from under the pile of comics. Jim gives a half smile, but she misses it as she looks around at the damage. “This is…wow.”
“Yeah,” Jim responds slowly.
Pam points at the long white box, laying on its side with its contents spilling out. “That thing was full?”
“Um, maybe.”
“Wow,” she repeats. She’s back on her feet, on tiptoe, peering up at the shelf from which the comics had just fallen. “You have at least three other ones up there,” she marvels.
“Ah…yes.”
“All full?”
“No?” he guesses. Incorrectly.
Pam’s smile can’t be contained but she starts replacing comics in the box without another word. Jim runs his palms over his pockets nervously as he watches her.
“I can do that,” he offers.
“No. I knocked them down.”
“Pam, I got it.”
“I don’t mind.”
“No really,” he says, sounding a little desperate. She studies him questioningly as he kneels and takes the books from her hands.
“Oh my God…are you putting them in order or something?” she finally asks.
Jim winces but continues. “Blankets are in my bedroom closet,” he mutters, checking an issue number.
----
“That’s a pretty sweater, Pam. Very autumn.”
“Thanks, Phyllis,” Pam replies, smiling down at herself.
“Where’s it from?”
“Um, the outlets. I think Gap maybe—”
“Is it true?”
Phyllis’s question was so quiet Pam isn’t sure she heard her. “Is it true…about the Gap?”
Phyllis is staring determinedly at the coffee she’s stirring. “No, is it true what they say about…big feet?”
Pam immediately glances down at her size seven feet in their brown flats. “I don’t…”
“Not you,” Phyllis whispers, glancing at Pam with one eyebrow raised suggestively.
The break room is eerily silent, and her reflection in the microwave door confirms Pam’s suspicion that she has, in fact, turned frighteningly pale.
“Oh,” she breathes.
“Because Jim must wear…what, a size thirteen?”
There is a long pause while Pam stares at Phyllis, whose eyes have gone wider.
“Fourteen?” she whispers, in a tone that’s distinctly hopeful.
“Oh,” Pam breathes again.
“Hey!” Jim chirps happily, suddenly filling the doorway. Phyllis looks between the pair and smiles knowingly.
“I’ve got…there’s…phone,” Pam manages as she hurries out.
----
Despite what he claimed later, she had knocked.
“Jim?”
“I don’t know what they want from me, it’s like the mo’ money we come across, the mo’ problems we see…”
Pam stops in her tracks. She’d never known Jim’s voice could get that high.
What came next – that is, after two deep “Uh!”s – is even more surprising.
“B-I-G P-O-P-P-A, no info for tha D-E-A…”
Yes, there are even hand gestures he fits in around sweeping the kitchen, distinctly white-guy-attempting-to-look-like-a-hardcore-rapper in nature.
“Federal agents mad cuz I’m flagrant – tap my cell and the phone in my basement…”
Pam has to lean against the couch so as not to collapse from laughing, as he’s taken to rapping the next few lines into his broom handle microphone.
“Gats in holsters, girls on shoulders…”
And it’s just as he throws his hands in the air that he spots her. His arms stay up for just a moment, then slowly lower, one hand removing his earbuds.
“Hey Beesly,” he attempts faux-casually.
“Hey.”
“Um…you’re early.”
She takes a deep breath to collect herself. “I am.”
“You…ah…I’m thirsty. Are you thirsty?” he asks, turning quickly toward the refrigerator.
She nods. “Word.”
----
“So I was thinking, maybe Saturday—”
It was quiet. At least there was that.
Quiet, but audible.
Jim’s eyes go wide and he leaves his musing unfinished; the blush of pure agony reddens Pam’s cheeks in what must be record time. She opens her mouth to offer excuse, but there is no squeaky chair or rubber-soled shoe to blame it on in bed. Her lips close again, but before her eyelids follow suit she sees Jim’s lips quiver just slightly.
“Please,” she begs, squeezing her eyes shut. “Please don’t.” She lets one eye open just enough to see that he couldn’t keep that pesky smile at bay.
“Did you just—”
“Please,” she moans, in a way she had before, in this very bed, but under drastically different circumstances.
“Wow,” he breathes, rubbing a hand over his face, as if to hide the fact that his smile has grown even bigger.
“Stop! Just stop!” She pulls the comforter over her head.
“Don’t do that – that can’t be a safe place to hide right now,” he laughs, wrestling the cover from her.
“Shut up!”
“I’m sorry,” he says through a chuckle, then takes a sobering breath. “I’m sorry,” he repeats, and she chances a look his way, pouting.
“I can’t believe I…did that.”
“It happens,” he says, shrugging.
She heaves a deep sigh, feeling her cheeks start to cool a bit. “Anyway…what about Saturday?” she attempts to say lightly, as if that hadn’t happened.
“Oh yeah…I was about to suggest I take you up on your offer to find me some new dishes.”
“That sounds good.”
He nods. “And after that maybe we could try that new Mexican place. But then again…” The sparkle in his eye is unmistakably impish.
She dives under the covers again.
----
Despite the assurances that it would just be “a little get together,” her parents’ small backyard was full. Friends and family had come to congratulate Pam and Jim on their engagement, and the mood was festive as the late September sun warmed the crowd.
Not that they can see this from their current locale, but they appreciate the sentiment.
“Someone’s going to come looking for us,” Pam says against Jim’s lips.
“You’re paranoid.”
She opens her mouth to argue but Jim silences her quickly, walking her backwards towards a bed that still sports the purple comforter she’d picked out in tenth grade. They both laugh as they fall onto the mattress. One of his hands is in her hair and one’s just pulled down the zipper of her sundress when a gasp stops them.
They sit up to see a blond cherubic angel – in this moment Pam can’t remember her name or which cousin claims the little one - watching them in horror. Their expressions mirror hers.
“It’s not—” Pam starts.
“Oh hey—” Jim says at the same time.
There is a silence.
“Pam and Jim…are having…SEX!” the child announces, for the benefit of all guests and presumably anyone within a five mile radius, then makes a run for it.
Pam finally looks Jim in the eye. “Cute kid,” he mutters.
“Who’s paranoid?” she hisses as she reaches for her zipper clumsily, then climbs off the bed. Jim stays where he is.
“You go ahead. I’ll be in here, trying to turn invisible.”
“Oh-ho no,” Pam says as she pulls at his hand, flashing her ring under his nose. “We’re a team now, buddy.”
Author's Chapter Notes:
This is a hardcore, explicit sex chapter, of a graphic nature the likes of which MTT has never seen before.
Oh God, I'm clearly kidding. It's five times Jim and Pam get embarrassed. C'mon, guys, this is me. (Sorry if I got your hopes up.) ;)
Oh God, I'm clearly kidding. It's five times Jim and Pam get embarrassed. C'mon, guys, this is me. (Sorry if I got your hopes up.) ;)
