Jim took a long, slow sip of his beer, gathering his thoughts as Jamie Beesley continued to stare him down. He slowly sat the bottle on the table and stared at her.
“How’s Pam doing?”
Jamie laughed loudly, scoffing at him. “Oh, that’s rich, Jim. How big of you to ask!?!” He just stared at her, not sure of what he should say. So, he just waited.
“Pam... how’s Pam doing? Well, let’s see… she feels like she the laughing stock of the town, Roy’s been nothing but a gigantic ass to her, she barely smiles and laughs anymore and… oh yeah, she’s unemployed, so I would say that she’s…”
Jim leaned forward. “Wait, wait, wait. What do you mean unemployed?”
Jamie shrugged at him. “She quit her job.”
Jim looked over his shoulder. “RYAN!!” he screamed. Ryan came over and stood next to the table, looking at Jamie. “Hey Jamie.”
“Hey Ryan.”
“You two know each other?” Jim asked, looking back and forth between the two of them. Jamie glared at him. “Yeah considering Ryan is one of the few people Pam will talk to these days” she said, putting the emphasis on Ryan’s name.
Jim looked up at Ryan. “Why didn’t you tell me Pam quit?”
“Well, Jim, as you put it so eloquently ‘I’m still on vacation. I’ll deal with the other stuff tomorrrow’.” Ryan sighed disgustedly and stalked back to the bar.
“You seem to be real popular these days” Jamie said, smirking at him.
“OK, Jamie, I get that your mad at me and everything, but will you please just tell me what happened, why Pam quit?”
“She was miserable, she had been for a long time, before… well, before that casino night, anyway. She hadn’t seen Roy since the non-wedding until Thursday. He said some nasty things to her about her and you and not being good enough. Apparently, she went back upstairs and… well, I guess she couldn’t take it anymore. I guess the proverbial straw was your replacement showing up and sitting down at your old desk. She just up and left and hasn’t been back.”
Jim dropped his hand down. “What did Roy say to her?”
“Why? All of a sudden you give a shit? Kiss my ass, Jim. My sister is…”
“Wonderful!” he screamed at her. “Pam is so much better than Roy ever gave her credit for. She deserves the life she wants. She shouldn’t ever have to settle for anything – not a job, not a husband, not a life, nothing! I mean, I could just…” Jamie watched as his face flushed and he wrung his hands together. ‘Well, well, well’ she thought to herself. “I could just kill that son of a bitch for making her feel bad about herself, for ever making her feel that way. Pam is… spectacular, more than… well, more than I deserve, at least, and definitely more than Roy deserves.”
“Huh” Jamie said, the anger washing off her face.
“What?”
Jamie smiled at him. “Let me let you in on a little Beesley family secret – no one liked Roy. My mother tolerated him because… well, that’s just how she is. Dad would hide and avoid Roy like the plague and well… let’s just say that Roy and I fought in high school and nothing has changed in 10 years. He had no use for me, I made sure that everyone saw him for the waste of space that he was and still is. No real love lost there.”
He just shook his head. “Why are you telling me this?”
“My sister, God love her, as always had this thing for, what I like to call, the ‘pricks’. Guys at school, in movies, guys we see out – she, for some reason, always has a soft spot for the cute guys who are completely self involved. I guess I just figured that you were going to be like that and… well, you’re not. I’m surprised.”
Jim sighed. “Pam deserves better than that type of guy.”
Jamie got up and moved around the table, dropping into the chair next to him. She leaned forward and rested her elbows on her knees. “I’m worried about her, Jim. She’s reverting into herself. She’s not our Pam, not anymore. She seems lost, like she doesn’t know which way to turn now. She needs someone.”
“And you think I’m that someone?”
“I do” Jamie said, grabbing her purse from across the table. She pulled out a pen and grabbed a napkin off the table and started scribbling on it. Jim watched as she pulled her keys out of her purse and quickly removed one of them, wrapping the napkin around it. She turned back to him and grabbed his hand, putting the napkin and key in his palm. She folded his fingers around it and squeezed his hand.
“My sister needs to be fixed, quickly. That’s your job.” Jim unfolded the napkin and saw an address written on it. “That’s my address and the key to my front door.” Jim looked up at her and he knew, in that moment, what he needed to do. He nodded at her and jumped up from his chair. He scurried around the tables and people and grabbed one of the hostesses. “I need you to call me a cab.”
TBC…
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© 2006-2023 More Than That | Skin created by Kali