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Story Notes:
Takes place after Casino Night...
Author's Chapter Notes:
Okay, so this takes place shortly after the Casino Night events. Just a short, could-be.
An hour after their encounter…
He sees a broken Miller Light bottle scattered around the stool next to him.

Who would even drink that stuff? He wonders, nursing his own Budweiser. Tastes too sour.

He winces as a girl brushes against his shoulder, her chocolate truffle hair dancing on his shoulder in a promiscuous hello. He blinks twice as her skirt flickers silently under the dimming disco ball, a shudder creeping around his broad shoulders, down his lean arms and to his fingertips against the frost of the glass.

He wonders if he should follow her. He wonders if he should keep staring at her in the way that he is or if that would start to look odd.

It’s a bar, he thinks hastily. And I’m no stalker.

He focuses his attention to the saliva beads on the opening of the Budweiser, his attention span fading as his toes fidget within his beaten-down, brown leather shoes.

It’s ironic how he always ends up here, at the same bar, at the same stool, once a week, week after week. He does not abuse alcohol, nor does he plan to, but the silent reminder that he’s away from the thing he calls “his life” is enough to draw him to the husky smell and dim lit bar across Scranton.

He takes a healthy swig of his beer, careful to leave a few mouthfuls in the bottle; he’s always been pragmatic when it came to his money.

There are a fistful of coins scattered around his place setting at the bar, glistening under the dim lights above. He looks at them, long and hard, and sees each as a chance he took, or didn’t take.

The pennies remind him of every time he has gone up to reception to steal some jellybeans. He doesn’t even like jellybeans. But he likes her.

There is one nickel, like the one after-work dinner they shared on the rooftop. It was the closest they had gotten to a real date. And probably the last “date,” too.

The dimes are like the moments they have had when he’s actually said something to convey his feelings. Like in the break room one afternoon, when she told him she wasn’t going to be taking the art classes. You gotta take a chance on something, sometime Pam.

And then there’s the quarter, the most expensive of the coins – the one with most leverage. It’s the heaviest one, too, the one that ways down your pockets when you have too many. Gratefully, but in a sad way, he’s only had one quarter-like moment with her, and it took place an hour and a half ago. What are you doing? What do you expect me to say to that? Those words burn.

His presence remains at the same bar stool for several minutes, but his mind drifts. He thinks about Pam, as he always does, and how he would give anything to have changed her mind.


The next morning…
There are tissues between her fingers as her eyes wander the evergreen horizon, reminding her of a time when things like day and night had a difference. She always wondered what he was thinking when he looked at her, but last night she knew his thoughts exactly because of the way his smile held turmoil and how the moon reflected off the tears in his hazel eyes.

It is a new day, or that’s what she tells herself as she stands on the porch of her apartment, her eyes in a different world over the sunrise in front of her.

He kissed her last night. Unlike in relationships before, she hadn’t prepared for the twinge of a confusing, love-stricken plunge into the depths of the realization that he always liked her. Yet here she is, a mere nine hours after his fingertips traced along her skin and his lips warm against hers and she can’t stand the sight of the sunrise without his voice in her ear and his fingertips along her spine.

Her eyes meander toward the tall grasses beyond her backyard that are in waking as they slumber lazily against the wind. Morning’s composure surrounds her, unlike the chaos of her life, and she feels a sense of relief as she perches herself on her tip-toes and gazes at the pumpkin sky with remorseful eyes.

“I don’t know how to feel,” she whispers to the sun, her words rhetorical.

A long sighhhh washes over her as her brows furrow and her lips part, remorse a noun as it leaks past her lips.

She remembers how he looked in the moonlight, how the warmth of his fingertips traveled through every one of her bones, how he struggled to admit the words she knew all along and how she continued to ignore them.

“Not anymore,” she breathes, tucking an auburn lock behind her ear and turning toward her apartment.
Suddenly she is inside, her kitchen a blur as she fumbles for her keys, wallet, and purse. Her breathing is quick and light, fleetingly in her lungs.

Her fist wraps around the chrome doorknob and she pulls, the morning air warm against her rosy cheeks.
She takes eleven steps to her car, revs the engine, and backs out of her narrow driveway, her hands sticky on the leather steering wheel beneath them.

Street signs blur past as she makes turns left and right, somehow pointing herself in the direction of reviving their chances.

Her eyes are wet as she reaches the first stoplight.

“What am I doing?” she says aloud as she clenches the steering wheel. She closes her eyes and all she can see is his hair dusting along his eyebrows, his wide, goofy grin and his dark, honest eyes when he told her he was in love with her.

As the light flickers green and she begins to continue forward, she realizes that the way his tears glistened made her want to change herself so that it wouldn’t hurt him anymore.

Seven minutes later she is in his driveway, regretting her presence there.

“He doesn’t want to see me after what I did. He might not even be home,” she tells herself, her voice vibrating throughout her small car.

Her heart is beating as fast as it did the night before when his lips hovered just above hers, when she told herself just this once.

In a quick motion she is at his doorstep and her hands are shaking violently.

She takes a breath and holds it for a moment before she gently taps her fingertips against the door, each knock a vibration of “I shouldn’t be doing this, I shouldn’t be doing this, I shouldn’t be doing this." Sunlight is pouring between the branches of the trees above her as her heart races along the track of their broken down relationship. The chrome doorknob twists skeptically as her breath catches in her throat, her heart on overdrive.

Her world halts as she sees the look in his eyes. He looks shaky as his mouth falls open and a tear drizzles across his cheek. His hair is ruffled from the stress of his hands and his eyes are dazzling under the sun’s rays. She swears he can hear her heartbeat as her tender lips part and her hazel irises teem tears.

She throws herself at his chest as their lips collide in fervent bliss. Her legs constrict his waist as her hands wrap around his neck and push into his hair. Passion is flying as his lips part and his tongue slides deep, his hands holding her back and bottom. Everything he has ever dreamed of is in his arms and the urge to never let go blooms within their restless lips, fingers, and hearts.

She presses her lips against the warmth of his nape and he shudders as he cocoons her closer.

“I’m sorry,” she whispers. He places his fingertips on her lips and shakes his head slowly.

“I shouldn’t have–” she begins. His hands are gentle as he holds her face to his and her tears trickle between his fingertips.

His eyes glisten as they did just hours before and she feels a pang of sorrow.

I’m doing this to him, she thinks, which causes her own tears to flow heavier.

“Don’t cry,” he says, his voice soft.

The way the warmth of his skin feels against hers is startling.

“Jim,” she breathes, “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking last night," she pauses, her words caught. "I want you. That’s it. I just want you.”
Her breathing is short as she is surprised she managed to say such words without an excessive amount of tears.

His eyes are deep in hers as a small, relieved smile spreads across his lips. Tears continue to fall. He swears he has never felt this perfect.

“Beesly,” he whispers, his lips spreading wider just above hers, “I’m so in love with you.”

And that morning, under the sun and clouds, between the grass and the treetops, and with the tender touch of their lips, Jim and Pam were irrevocable.
Chapter End Notes:
I wish I could make it into more chapters but there isn't much else to say! Besides, I have other stories to work on! Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it!


Dwangie is the author of 25 other stories.



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