- Text Size +
Author's Chapter Notes:
Set pre-series and splits from continuity at "The Secret"
They have, you know.

No, not that. There wasn't enough punch in the world to turn her into that sort of girl, and he wasn't that sort of boy. But they did kiss once. Well, one time.

* * *

Way too late in the night at the Christmas party before last was when it happened. Roy was in the warehouse (most of the party) and Pam knew that when he came back he would stink like a skunk and laugh at all her jokes. Roy wouldn't be back for a while though.

She'd had the two cups of punch Roy had pressed on her before he and the guy who always came over to sell him his marijuana did some exchange and then whispered and nodded. A couple of the office guys went down after them as well.

She was glad Roy hadn't invited her, and served herself her own third cup of punch. She spent a lot of time with Jim, hiding out in accounting, making paperclip chains and talking. Just talking, you know?

Then Michael found them and dragged her off to be the visual aid some complicated but not horrifyingly embarrassing joke. Jim was across the room and his expressions helped her laugh at almost the right moments and that was enough for Michael. The fact that she was pretty tipsy helped too, and she giggled almost hysterically at his impressions of the cast of Seinfeld.

It happened in the smaller supply closet, like something straight out of a sexual harassment video. She'd only gone in there because Michael was making wallpaper from his photocopied ass. He wanted mint to go with the pink, because that was "Christmas-y, Pam. Duh."

Nothing was on the properly labeled shelf and she took the time to put things back in their place. She was in no rush to get back to the noisy party. She felt a little dizzy when she stood in the middle of it, surrounded without her armor of the reception desk. She wasn't in a rush to get back to anything but talking to Jim, really.

She was kneeling next to the improperly put away L272 (seafoam legal-sized) Weyerhauser Husky Xerocopy DP when she heard the breathing behind her and she did get scared a little. Roy tried to get creative when he was high and she didn't want to think about adjusting everything and if anyone could tell when she walked back into the party. If Michael noticed he might say something bad enough to make her start crying, and Roy would probably laugh too. So that's why she was scared.

Only it wasn't Roy. It was Jim. He leaned heavily, head on the door frame, but still his shoulders took most of the space and blocked her view of the inspirational "Persistance" poster with the beautiful sunlight through the trees on the golf course. She realized that he was drunker than she'd thought, and he wasn't smiling.
He was looking at her.

She looked down and asked, "Could you do me a favor?"

"Yes."

"Could you tell Michael that when he photocopies his butt, we're not supposed to be able to see his . . . you know."

"No. I don't."

She giggled. "You're not going to get me to say it."

"Not if I don't know what it is, I won't." He rolled off the door frame, put a hand on the counter to her right and took a step towards her. He was wearing outside of work clothes, a blue sweater that made his eyes the hue that got her craving her watercolors.

He smelled nice too, nice enough that she had to swallow.

"His guy parts," she said, waving her hand at Jim's pants. She realized that she was still kneeling and he was standing in front of her and all of a sudden she felt inappropriate, so she stood.

He did that thing with his mouth where he was trying not to smile and his lips squeezed together. She licked hers and she saw his gaze shift. She waited for it to shift back before she started speaking, but it didn't so she said, "His, you know. . . "

"I know. I have boy parts too." He made a lopsided grin and it was funny so she smiled back.

At that point she was filing all of it away. The way her tongue kept going back to the sweetness of the punch on her lips. And God, how tall he was when he stood this close because he really was. He was nice and tall, and she'd back up if she could, but the counter was right there, firm against the small of her back.

She could see him thinking, not what he was thinking but she could see thoughts moving his face. Then he bit his lip. He swayed just a tiny bit and put his hand back on the counter and really wished she knew where hers were supposed to go right now.

"I like your shirt," he said.

It wasn't a slutty top. Roy had wanted her to wear a sluttier top, but she'd lost the two cleavagy ones he'd given her for her birthday, and she was very proud of herself that she'd convinced him that it was too cold to wear her shorter skirt. This was where she worked, where they worked, and she knew that whatever she wore would be stared at by Darryl and the rest of Roy's friends in the warehouse. She didn't like the way Roy smiled when his friends looked at her.

She had compromised. Her top was red, a little more form fitting, and she had her nice bra on. It only showed a teeny-tiny little bit of cleavage unless you looked straight down it and Jim wasn't doing that.
Her bra strap kept peeking out and she had to keep nervously tugging it up to her shoulder. She didn't want to draw attention to it, but she couldn't think of anything else but the fact that she was standing in front of Jim with her bra strap showing.

He tilted his head, then said, "Tonight I'm allowed to compliment your girl parts, right?"

"Just tonight," she said to Jim.

"Well then, you look extra pretty tonight," he said.

"That's not complimenting my girl parts," she said. "That's complimenting me."

"The girl parts are part of you," he said, without looking down at them.

She heard Michael's voice outside, and the words "Congo line" and music and she just shook her head and rolled her eyes.

"You wanna?" Jim nodded back at the hallway.

"God no," she said. She shook her head again.

That's when Jim shut the door on the supply closet. And he stopped smiling again. "I have a problem," he said.

She waited for the punchline, but he didn't give her that. He just unhooked the arm of the paper cutter and watched it spring up. Pushed it down a few times and let it spring up.

Finally, she asked, "What is it?"

She filed away each of his expressions. She was drunk enough that she would probably go through them one by one while Roy got affectionate, later on tonight.

Jim sliced the paper cutter up and down a few times, first gently then a little more roughly. She opened one of the packets and handed him a few sheets and he smiled. Started to slice it into little strips.

"It's nothing," he said. "Never mind."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. Yeah," he said.

She could see the shape of his chest better in this shirt. She'd seen him change real fast at his desk for a date once. She'd been coming back from the bathroom and she didn't think he'd known she was there. He'd almost been late, fixing stuff that Michael had screwed up. He'd had what Roy called a wife-beater on, and when he lifted his arms to sniff his armpits, she'd seen his muscles.

She'd seen the long, pretty line of his biceps, and the curve of his pectoral muscle and she'd sketched that image of him (without his face) for days, carefully burning each picture. For a day or two after she saw Jim in just his undershirt, she'd felt funny when she talked with him.

Roy was no good posing for her because he'd always get hard and then get up and want to make love to her before she even got a speed sketch down. She hadn't bothered asking him to pose for her in a long time. Part of what had made her feel funny talking to Jim after spying on him changing was what had happened that night.

As usual, Roy had made her touch herself so he could jerk off and get himself hard after he'd had too much to smoke and drink. She'd thought about Jim while she did it.

She'd thought about him in that white tank top and maybe his boxer shorts. She'd thought about how he might have blushed if he'd caught her watching him. She'd thought about asking him to pose for her, for some important drawing she had to do that Roy didn't know about, and she thought about him taking off his clothes. She'd thought about whether he would stay still and soft, but then Roy was on her, trying to stuff himself in her even though he still wasn't hard enough.

She'd been wet enough, though, so it had kind of worked. She'd watched the few glow-in-the-dark stars in the corner of the ceiling, ones Roy hadn't noticed after he'd told her to take the moon and stars and stuff down. When Roy started moving on her, sweating on her, she'd thought about putting her hands on Jim's chest. She'd thought about pushing her fingers up, into his armpits, touching that hair.

Then, when Roy had flipped her over and put his hand on her neck and pushed her face into the pillow she'd been trying to breathe and not make too much noise because he was hurting her. It had felt like he was going to try to 'accidentally' put it in her butt, she'd zoned out and pushed the pillow out of the way. Her cheek and chin rubbed on the mattress where the fitted sheet had popped up, and she'd imagined it was Jim's chest.

In the tiny supply closet, she felt herself blushing at the memory, and she turned away from Jim. She put the blue paper up in the right shelf, and then reached and tried to put the canary away. Canary did not belong on the salmon shelf, they were totally different colors. The shelf for canary was too high up, and she waited for Jim to help her.

"You need help," he said.

"Uh-huh."

His hands were on her waist, her ribs, her hips, like he was trying to find the right place. Then he found it, gripped her, lifted her up easily. He set her on her knees on the counter.

It was easy to put the paper in the right cubbies, and without her asking, he got the lilac and the hot pink and handed them to her one at a time so she could put them in their place. Then there wasn't any paper left to put away and she sat on the counter, knees together, really aware that she was wearing a skirt. It had two layers, and together they were opaque, but the top one was slid half way up her thigh, and she could see the pilly lace at the bottom of her slip.

"Sorry," she said. She moved the hems to cover her knees, then tilted them further to the side, so they would stop bumping his hip. She really, really wanted to touch his chest then, touch the curve of it, and so she put her hand on it. Gently, she pushed him so she could have room to jump down.

He didn't budge at first, just stood there, breathing and very eye-level with her. She could hear him breathing, through his nose. He was the last person getting over the office cold, and there was a tiny hiss with every breath. His lips pressed tight together again, tight enough that they went a little white. She pushed him again, and he swayed back just a little, then forward again.

"Tell me what your problem is," she said.

"Nah." He looked down at her lap. "I'm kind of a little drunk."

"Me too," she said. She glanced back over her shoulder at the stacks of binder clips, then she put her finger to her lips, turned real quick to face him and said, "Shhhhhhh."

He beamed right back at her and she knew she was being very bad, talking to him in here. If she was caught she'd be in trouble and Roy would probably hit Jim, and she might not be able to work here any more. But none of those thoughts would stick in her head.

Jim put his hand on the counter next to them. There really wasn't much room in here. The counters and cubbies took up most of the space, all around, and there was maybe six feet by three feet of floor space. He put his other hand on the counter on the other side and she folded her hands in her lap.

She laughed nervously, and put her hands on his chest to push him again, but he didn't budge. She pushed a little harder and looked him in the eye to say something, but her mouth was so dry that her tongue felt like it was stuck.

Then he put both hands on her cheeks and that was enough to make her nipples feel all prickly. She felt something like cramps building in her gut but it didn't hurt. The feeling got up in her stomach and her chest and right when it reached her throat, Jim put his mouth on hers.

She heard him groan, and because her hands were still on his chest, she felt it there too. He touched her hair, petted her head and she felt his hands shaking. He put a hand on her knees and pushed them both to the side and stepped closer. It was awkward and one of her knees bumped him between his legs. She felt the boy parts they'd been talking about. And she wanted, wanted, wanted.

He didn't open his mouth as he kissed her. When she her hands dropped a few inches, he sucked in a breath and she felt his belly move. He moved his mouth off of hers but kept it real close, and she could see that he had his eyes open, so close they merged. He hovered there, nose touching hers, mouthfuls of breath tickling her lips. He was gasping like he'd just finished running and she realized she was too.

His hands felt too big on her head and her knee. To big and hot and she felt herself sweating. Felt drops roll down from her underarms, down the side of her ribs. Outside, "The rhythm is gonna get you" started again and someone whooped as they passed by the closet.

Jim staggered back and held out his hands, palms at her. "I'm so—I'm so sorry. That was—"

She still wasn't breathing right. Felt dizzy and had to clutch the counter. "I had punch too," she said.

"Can I kiss you again one more time?" he said real fast, at the end of one breath.

"Oh, God."

"Please."

"Okay," she said. "Okay, just one more time."

"Okay," he said.

Then he took one big step and he was turning her face and kissing her right below her ear. She pushed his chest again, and he looked like she'd slapped him, like he was going to cry, but she wasn't pushing him away. She was just trying to move her knee so it was on the other side of him. She pulled the front of his sweater, pulled him towards her once more and his mouth dropped open.

He breathed out like she'd punched him, then he was cradling the back of her head and being really careful of her barrette. He kissed her for real and his tongue tasted like punch and also like one of those Listerine cinnamon strips that freaked her out when it clung to the roof of her mouth.

His hands kept moving, from her knees to her shoulders to her face, but hers stayed on his chest. She kept tracing up and down his breastbone, down to the top of his flat stomach then up again. He made another noise and she felt herself starting to tear up. She felt a tear roll down her cheek and she felt really, really angry all of a sudden.

She wanted to be really bad with him. She wanted to be really bad like one of those girls on the DVDs Roy liked watch while he made love to her from behind. She wanted to touch Jim's boy parts, but instead she squeezed her knees against his hips and put her hands on his belt.

He made another noise, like she was hurting him, and then he wrapped his arms around her. He squeezed her hard enough that it hurt a little and she couldn't breathe and she didn't want to.

She put her hand up his sweater, tugged out his t-shirt and touched the skin on his stomach. Touched his belly button, and the line of hair beneath it, and above it. She pushed up his shirt and he helped her, pulled it up for her and watched, open mouthed as she ran her palms back and forth on his abs, his ribs.

"What?" he said. "What do you want? Anything. Anything, please."

She couldn't talk, though. She just pulled up her sweater until her stomach was bare, then she wrapped her arms around his chest and hugged him close. He held her, one arm around the back of her head, one around her back and she stayed there, belly moving against his as she breathed.

All her tears started coming out then, and she was really careful not to make any noise while she cried, because then this would be over. She took really deep breaths and listened as he kept saying, "Anything you want. Anything." Then she let out one breath and it shuddered enough for him to hear and he was pulling away from her.

His sweater fell back down, and so did hers. He backed all the way up to the door. She could see his hard-on poking against the front of his trousers, and then she could see that his cheeks were wet too.

"I shouldn't have done that, and I'm sorry. Oh god, I'm sorry, Pam. Please don't—"

"No. No no no," she said, hopping off the counter and smoothing down the front of her skirt. "It didn't, it's not, don't even. I'm probably not even going to remember this tomorrow."

"Oh, me neither," he said. "No, I'm drunk, and I'm sorry and I'm—" his voice trailed off and he stared at her. "Can I kiss you again?"

"That would be a bad idea."

"You're right. You're really, yeah," he said. He swallowed a few times, then tucked his t-shirt back into his pants. Her eyes were drawn back to his boner, and then he put his hands in front of it. "I have to leave," he said. "I have to go right now."

"You should," she said.

"I have to go. I can't stay in here with you."

"No, you can't."

"I can't, I can't—"

"You can't," she said, wiping her face on her sleeve. "I know."

"I'm sorry."

"I'm not going to say anything," she said. "I'm not going to, you know."

"Yeah. That's good. That's a good idea."

"Because nothing happened."

"Yes." He pounded his fist on the counter hard enough to make the paper cutter jump. "Yes, you're right. Nothing happened. Nothing at all. I have to go."

Then he was shutting the door behind him and she couldn't breathe at all. Her legs stopped working right and she fell to the floor hard enough to bruise her knees.


Kate Andrews is the author of 1 other stories.
This story is a favorite of 45 members. Members who liked Canary also liked 1337 other stories.


You must login (register) to review or leave jellybeans