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Story Notes:
I decided to take a crack at JAM babies! wooooo! Now if only we could get this in real life! I don't own the office. No copyright infringement is intended.
Author's Chapter Notes:
just a little idea that popped into my head! :]

She’s imagined all her life what it would be like. She’s thought of tiny fingers curled around fists and pink wooden blocks and soft skin against her cheek. She’s scared. She doesn’t know what kind of mother she’s going to be. But she has someone else to help her along and this someone is so infused with joy that its bordering on impossible not to feel it too. Feel as though maybe, just maybe, the world could stretch a little, grow a little, and become more than perfect. Her stomach’s going to grow along with it. She closes her eyes and feels hands on her belly, tracing tiny circles across her taut skin. He’s almost touching it, little pieces of them slowly becoming one. It’s only a matter of time.

~

At two in the morning, she almost doesn’t make it. She hurls through the bathroom door, collapses in front of the toilet, and spills an entire steak dinner – twenty-seven dollar steak, no less, a celebration of their six month anniversary – into the bowl. She rests her head against the cool porcelain, hating this sickening feeling almost as much as she hates the fact that an expensive beautiful evening is, quite literally, about to be flushed down the tubes. Her thoughts are interupted by another unexpected onset. This time, there are soothing hands on her back, holding her curls away from her face as she coughs up what little food was left.

Pam sighs wearily, flushes the toilet. Jim hands her a toothbrush, wiping sleep from bleary eyes. His hair sticks up, mussed to the point of comedy. Without being asked, he finds an elastic so he can tenderly tie back her hair. She gives him a small toothpaste smile in the mirror. He really is the sweetest.

“Why does having a baby have to be so disgusting?” she whines, sinking heavily into his embrace as he rubs her shoulders, chuckles into her hair. “I’m not even huge yet!” She bridges the band of her sweatpants, feeling the flat strip of skin that will inevitably turn into a watermelon.

“I guess some of it has to suck, “ he replies, planting a soft kiss on her forehead, before carrying her wordlessly back to bed.

He drifts off to sleep almost immediately, one arm still soothingly resting on her stomach. She has quietly entwined their fingers, two wedding bands glinting in pale moon. She sits wondering about the tiny something that is slowly growing inside her, what he is dreaming about, and seriously hoping that she won’t have to jolt to the bathroom again.

Just a typical first trimester night.

~

They go to birthing class on Thursdays, sharing pretzel sticks with twenty other pregnant women while a coach drones on at length. He runs her hot baths, makes trips out to the store at the last second for the oddest cravings. She holds up fingers, repeating over and over that she’s simply pregnant, not disabled, but he is still at her side whenever she needs anything and for that, she finds him adorably sweet. They have conversations on baby names alone.

Jim goes out and buy a tiny jersey, looks at swatches for pink paint and flowered wallpaper. They have decided it will be a surprise and while she knows he’ll be dazzled by whatever comes their way and would never say anything, she has a feeling he has his heart set on a boy.

She sits in the evening with her feet up, twisting her almost-year-old wedding band and thinking how lucky she is. It isn’t all easy. There are times when the sauce burns or she’s especially achy or when she has a day-long bout with morning sickness three days straight and she curls up in a ball (as best she can) and wants to be left alone and wallows in how miserable she is, mad at him for 'doing this to her.'

But then he comes in with a cup of tea and heating pads and gorgeous kisses all over and she realizes its all just crazy pregnancy hormones and apologize and the sheets of their carefully made bed tangle and eventually fall to the floor.

He whispers at night, holding her hand, telling her how excited he is, running gentle fingers over her growing belly and talking about the future. She finds him when the baby is kicking and places his palms over her sweatshirt so he can feel. Michael calls umpteenth times asking whether or not he can be the godfather. They don’t really give him a straight answer.

~

“Pam!”

“In here,” she calls, from the bathroom, voice sounding distant in the front hall. He makes his way inside the house, struggling with three bulging plastic bags. He’s pretty sure he bought everything in the dairy aisle. Positive he left Scranton’s Costco chip-less on this frigid Februrary evening. He tries not to make marks on the newly painted hallway and pushes the door open with the toe of his shoe.

“Did you get it?” She’s shiny and wet in a claw-footed tub, surrounded by foaming bubbles, cheeks flushed pink. Her hair is piled on top of her head in an effort to keep it dry but loose strands have slid out and curled sticky and damp around her face. After 16+ months of marriage, she still takes his breath away. He swallows, grins, remembers the bags.

“Did I get ‘it’?” He sets what is probably 30 pounds of food on the floor and goes to kiss her. Her skin radiates heat as he presses his lips to her forehead. “You can honestly reduce four different kinds of chips, two cartons of double fudge ice cream, celery, Rice Krispies, dill pickles and beef jerky to ‘it’?”

She gives him a look as he kneels by the tub. “I’m going to splash you.”

He grins. “Now that would be entirely uncalled for. I spent 20 minutes clearing ice off the car in the most crowded parking lot ever in –30 degree weather. For you.”

She bats her eyelashes. “Thank you,” she says sweetly.

“And yes,” he clarifies, reaching for the closest bag, “I did get it. All of it.”

He begins pulling contents out as she watches approvingly. “Mm, Jim, I want – oooh.” Her leg splashes water out of the side of the tub, narrowly missing her husband. Her eyes have closed, hands suddenly under the water.

Jim’s stomach clenches. “Bees? Are you okay?”

She holds a dripping finger to her lips. “Baby, baby, baby. What did I say about kicking? Your chocolate ice cream is on its way, but you need to be patient.” Pam opens her eyes, suddenly grinning. “All good. Now. Ice cream, please.”

He comes back with two spoons and a tie off. He feeds her bites and imagines their baby eating ice cream below the surface of the water. It almost makes him laugh.

Eventually, stomachs achingly full of double chocolate chunk, he slips into the lukewarm bathwater, wrapping arms around his wife, holding her tight while snow whirls itself against the windows. The baby kicks again, against his fingers, and when she kisses him, she tastes like soap.

~

It’s a rare occasion now when she takes a shower. It bothers her that she can’t see her feet, see the chili pepper red Jim painted sloppily on her toes, or the water swirling down the drain and away. She’s wrapped in a towel, attemping to dry aimlessly dripping curls, when she notices the mirror. On steamed glass, he’s quietly written 17 baby names, with a heart drawn around one. Dwight.

Perfect.

Chapter End Notes:
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