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Be not so fearful now my love,
I'll come and cover you with wings
Be not so anxious all the time,
listen to how the highway sings
I know the ghosts of memory
are waging wars inside your mind
Just walk with me into the light, you will be fine
Tonight, you tell me your mother told you she's really lonely, still, since the divorce, and you have this horribly worried look on your face that reminds me of that time two years ago when this whole thing started, and I hate it so much that I say something funny. I don’t even remember what I say, really, but it’s some witty comment that I hope will make you laugh.
Except you don't laugh.
Instead, you untangle yourself from the throw I've placed over us while we're watching TV, and my arms immediately miss you as you angrily declare that I can never “just be serious,” and march upstairs.
A door slams.
I shake my head. I had just wanted you to smile.
I make my way upstairs, toward the closed bathroom door. I pause just outside it, afraid that maybe you're crying, and my heart sinks because it kills me when you cry. The sound of running water on the opposite side of the door lets me know this isn't the case; you're running a bath, apparently. Still, I can't stop myself from knocking. We don't fight often, but when we do – when this happens – I hate it.
“Pam?”
“I don't want to talk right now. I'm taking a bath.” You don't sound angry, just hurt, and somehow that hits me harder.
“Alright.” I rest my head against the door, feeling like an idiot. “Can we talk when you get out?”
There is a pause, a short pause, but a pause nonetheless, and it breaks me further.
“Yeah,” you say softly, finally.
“Okay.”
I turn back toward our adjacent bedroom and follow it out into the hallway. I quietly step into the beautiful nursery you so diligently painted for Cecelia, who is sleeping peacefully in her crib. I just stand in the doorway, watching her for a couple of moments, taking her in. I find myself doing this often; I'm mesmerized by our daughter. She has your hair, auburn with a hint of curl, but she has my eye shape, and my nose (sorry about that). She sleeps with one arm dramatically placed across her forehead. Seeing these little bits of both of us in her, a separate human being, will never cease to be awesome.
When I walk back into our bedroom, I stare at the photograph of us by the bed. You look so happy in that picture, with my arms wrapped protectively around you.
I used to worry that something would take you away from me. I feared that because you were finally infused into my life, I would lose you. The whole rug-pulled-out-from-under-me thing.
Sometimes, in just the right shaky moments, I still do.
I find myself drifting back toward the bathroom door. Hesitantly, I try again. “Hey, Pam?”
Silence for a moment and then, “Yeah?”
“Can I come in?”
“Yeah.” It's a whisper, but I hear it.
I cautiously open the door, move to sit on the lid of the toilet seat. You don't even open your eyes from your spot in the bathtub.
I start talking anyway, but you keep your eyes closed in an angry defiance.
I do take things seriously. I do worry, a lot even.
One eye cracks open at this revelation and I smile to myself.
Now, no, I don't worry about the speed of Erin's computer nor am I really too concerned with the cable bill being paid two days late (really, babe, I don't think they even noticed). I don't think your mother feels horribly alone (how could she with an awesome daughter like you?) and I think Egypt will probably turn out okay.
Instead...
I have an irrational fear of you taking these “long, hot” bubble baths. It started when you were pregnant with Cece and you'd get those dizzy spells every so often that would scare the hell out of me. I was always afraid you'd accidentally make the bath too hot and then you'd pass out and hit your head and the door would be locked, because you have this habit of locking it, and then I wouldn't be able to get in and...yeah, I've thought way too much about this. But I mean, you only exacerbated my fears that time when, after over an hour of you still being in the bath, I knocked on the door to check on you and you didn't respond.
“Pam?” I called again, louder, but determined to keep my voice controlled.
Still no answer. Control left and I instantly freaked out, shouting your name and practically pounding on the door as my worst fear was so clearly being realized.
Nothing.
I ran back into our adjoined bedroom, honestly feeling like my heart would beat out of my chest, and grabbed a wire coat hanger from our closet. I shoved it into the lock and broke into the bathroom door like a mad man, only to find you fast asleep in the tub, your head against one of those bath pillows you bought at the $0.99 store, completely relaxed.
“PAM!” I screamed anyway, adrenaline flowing through me, and you jerked into alertness, slapping the water in the bath and sending a strong splash through the air in response.
“WHAT?!” You screeched back in equal alarm, and I grabbed your face and kissed you right there in the tub, truly close to actually crying, because you scared the crap out of me.
This is why I haven't let you lock the door during these 'you' times since, even though Cece is here now and your body is back to being able to withstand higher temperatures.
Because you just never know.
I sometimes freak out, sometimes feel really frazzled, when we run out of dishwashing detergent. No, no, it isn't because I'm too lazy to wash dishes by hand (although I do think this would maybe be a slightly valid reason). It's just that my mind drifts back to that day when you got distracted somehow and reached into the soapy water without looking, allowing that brand new knife we got as a housewarming gift to be cleaned by your hand instead of the sponge.
I was on the phone with Pete in the living room, only half-listening to him as I flipped through the television channels. You called my name softly at first, your voice trembly and high-pitched, and then morphing into a loud panic as you cried out once more.
I didn't even tell Pete what was going on – I just hung up on him at the sound of your screams and sprinted into the kitchen where you were standing before the sink, shaking as tears fell rapidly down your face.
“What - “ I stopped short, noticing your hand and the blood and I swear my heart stopped for a second. “Oh, my God.” I reached for your wrist and gently placed your hand under the running water of the faucet, trying to rinse off the wound just enough to see how bad it was even though I knew in the pit of my stomach that you'd need stitches.
“I cut it with the knife,” you whimpered, wincing in pain.
I took a deep breath, trying not to openly freak out as I stared past the broken skin into parts of your hand I knew weren't supposed to be seen. “It's okay, babe, it's okay.” I focused on keeping my voice controlled for you, wrapping your hand in a thick dish towel and leading you out of the kitchen toward the door. “We're just going to go by the emergency room, okay? You're gonna be okay. Take a deep breath...”
The hospital is twenty minutes away from our house, but my speeding got us there in ten and the dish towel draped across your hand was stained red. I led you into the hospital and the nurse or medical assistant or whomever it was at the desk had the nerve to ask me to sign you in and have a seat. I had been trying to keep my cool for you, but it all fell apart in that moment as I explained in a voice that went against all my jokey, never-want-to-be-frazzled ways, that my fiancee had cut her hand with a knife and it had been gushing for over ten minutes and there really, truly wasn't time for us to just hang out in the waiting room.
They led us back to an exam room.
I sometimes freak out when you're sick – particularly when you're sick enough to lie in bed all day, because it just isn't you. I can handle a cold, things like that, but at least once a year you always get one of those illnesses that confine you to our couch cushions and I'll lay my hand on your forehead and it's like ice in a fire and your eyes look so weak and not Pam and it's really more than I can handle.
Pregnancy almost killed me.
See? You're grinning! My plan is working!
Seriously, though – yes, I used the term seriously – it's hard to explain what it's like to see someone you love in varying degrees of discomfort and have it be considered normal and not worthy of reporting. In any other circumstance, if you were constantly falling asleep at work and becoming violently ill every hour, I'd have you at a doctor's office in a second, if not the emergency room. There would be tests run and medications prescribed. But when I voiced my concerns at your OB appointment, the doctor actually smiled. He smiled and suggested ginger tea. Ginger tea. And Seabands. And plenty of rest. What the...? How were those things going to help?
I was sure I'd be dead by the second trimester, if I had to watch you continue to suffer like that.
But now we have Cece, and she's gorgeous, which is no surprise. We're happy, right? See, that's why this whole thing with your mom...I don't like how she's always complaining to you, because it brings you down with her. It does something to you. Every response is visceral and it brings me back to that time two years ago, that week your dad stayed with us. I think the memory of it is the reason I'm always trying to keep you laughing.
I was sitting at my desk and you came over from reception and said in this shaky voice that you only ever use when something is very wrong, “I know this is weird, but I feel like I can't breathe.”
“What?” Your shoulders rapidly rose and fell, and I realized you were actually hyperventilating. I reached out to touch your arm. “What's wrong?”
“I don't know, I just – I can't breathe. I can't get a full breath. And my chest hurts.”
“What – How does your chest hurt? Like, shooting pain or...?” My own heart was racing.
“I don't know. Just, like, pressure.”
Dwight peered up at us from his computer. “Is there a history of heart attack in your family? Heart Disease? Arterial plaque?”
“Dwight, shut up,” I heard myself say, and I saw his eyes widen slightly. For as much grief as I give Dwight, I'm not usually that blunt.
“I feel really dizzy.”
I jumped up then, literally jumped up from my chair, and grabbed you entirely, sitting you down at my desk. I noticed you were shaking. And pale. God, you were pale...
“Do I need to call an ambulance?” I couldn't think straight. “Just tell me what I need to do.”
“Oh, my God, PAM?!” Michael rushed out of his office, dramatically shouting for someone to do just that. “Call an ambulance! Somebody! Anybody! She's having a heart attack! PAM! Stay with us, Pam! DO NOT GO TOWARD THE LIGHT!”
“Michael, it's – stop.” Your voice was shaky, but firm, and you looked to me pleadingly. “Can you take me to the hospital?”
I don't think I even answered, just yanking my messenger bag off the back of my chair and then grabbing you, yelling for someone to get me your purse.
And I'll never forget how, when I told the hospital staff you were having trouble breathing, one of them asked in this oddly casual tone: “Does she think she's having a heart attack?”
I shook my head furiously. “NO! She's not having a heart attack...she's just...” Right? You couldn't have a heart attack at 29...right? It struck me then that I didn't know. I didn't know if you were having a heart attack or not. I think this is the moment where I can definitively say that, up to this point in my life, that is the most scared, the most worried, I've ever been.
When we were informed that it was anxiety – a panic attack – this simultaneous feeling of relief and something like anger washed over me as I nodded; relief that it wasn't a heart condition, and I’m not going to lie, really quite pissed off that your parents’ issues had led you to this response.
You were quiet on the drive home. Yes or no answers to things. I asked how you were feeling and you simply said you wanted to sleep, could you just sleep for the rest of the day?
That isn't like you. You don't do that. You're a ball of energy. But I nodded without question.
You went straight to our bedroom when we walked in the door, and I leaned against it for a second, drained.
It occurred to me that you hadn't eaten in several hours, and while I hadn't either, it concerned me more that you hadn't – it seemed like food might make you feel more okay or something – so I headed up the staircase to our bedroom, and opened the door to where you were curled up on our bed. “Hey, can I make you something for dinner? Anything you want, Restaurant of Jim--”
You were crying.
“Hey...”
I quickly lowered myself down on the bed, the mattress creaking with the sudden new weight, and pulled you toward me. “I'm really sorry,” you were saying, as my lips found your hair, your forehead, your cheek.
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I promised. “Absolutely nothing.”
Neither of us said anything for a few moments and then I said, “You know, Pam, you can't change what's happened with your parents. You can't. But you can change how it's affecting you.” Who did I think I was, Dr. Phil? But still, I continued. “You're literally making yourself sick. It's...you have to give yourself a break. This is out of your hands.”
I thought you might yell at me for my sudden embodiment of a mid-day talk show host, but instead, you nodded. “I know. You're right.”
I really need to place emphasis on the fact on this day, you said I was right. Has this ever happened since?
Your eyes fly open as you laugh now, and you splash me with water that smells like cherry blossoms.
But see, this is what I want – I want you to laugh and be happy. It's so simple, but I want it for you. I don't want anxiety attacks. I don't want fights and silences. I just want that happiness. I know you need to care about your parents – but there has to be a boundary.
We’re happy, right?
And honestly, truly, when things are at their absolute worst, I'm still completely happy as long as I'm with you.
Stop groaning. You said you like cheesy!
I lean over to kiss you and there are tears in your eyes. You know.
Author's Chapter Notes:
I promised Sally a Jim POV chapter for her birthday, so this is my (late) present to her. Sometimes when Jim jokes, Pam seems annoyed, so I thought it'd be neat to give it some backstory. And it's kind of long (TWSS). I don't know how it happened.
The song lyrics at the beginning are from a sweet song by Beat Radio called "Fearful."
I hope you enjoy!
The song lyrics at the beginning are from a sweet song by Beat Radio called "Fearful."
I hope you enjoy!
Oldleaf is the author of 1 other stories.
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