“So this is it, Halpert. This is where the high school magic happened?”

Jim chuckled watching Pam plop her bottom on to the edge of his childhood bed, in the room that his parents had left mostly intact since he’d moved out all those years ago.

Rolling his eyes, he toed her flip-flopped foot with his own, his lips quirking at toes that were painted a fresh shade of sky blue.

“Need I remind you that ‘high school Jim was very, very dorky? Seriously, Pam, I think my right hand had more action up here than any girl.”

She shivered, overdramatically at that, and began to stand from the mattress, her face now twisted into a comical expression that screamed “I have to touch wet food in the kitchen sink.”

“Oh, bite me,” Jim chuckled, sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling her back down by the shoulders. “I wasn’t even allowed to have girls up here without the door wide open and one or more of my siblings playing babysitter in the doorway. I’m honestly surprised Ger-Bear let you up here in the first place.

He was smiling warmly now, as his fingers brushed a stray lock from her eyes and tucked it behind her ear.

“Oh yeah? And why’s that? Does he think I have impure intentions with his baby boy? Hmm?” she quipped, her fingers skating lightly down his abdomen as she tickled up to his armpits with a devilish stare to accompany the quirk in her eyebrow.

“I don’t know, Pam,” he challenged, doing his best to suppress the erratic shakes in reaction to her touches. “Just what are your intentions with me?”

And like the flick of a switch, his eyes were wide and his fingers spanned her stomach, loud pinches of laughter echoing off the dull walls of his boyhood bedroom, bouncing between posters of the Foo Fighters, a 1988 NFC East Champion Eagles, and a life-sized poster of one Spud Webb displayed proudly next to his bed, where a growing Jimmy Halpert measured himself every day until he surpassed the poster in fifth grade. She kicked her feet merrily, doing her best to defend herself from his tickling, but to no avail.

Somehow, he found himself hovering above her, braced on one forearm while the other hand continued to press across her stomach. It was then, his hair flopping in his eyes, the minty scent of her gum filling the space between them, that he had to stop and catch his breath.

The world moved in slow motion, then. Her auburn curls flashing gold in the bright sunlight that cascaded through the curtains were splayed across his navy blue comforter, swishing back and forth as she twisted beneath his touch. Her jaw hung open, her head tilted back, in a smile that could knock the stars from the sky. Her eyes radiated golden, the green brushed from hazel as they were overcome with some immense joy that, he sheepishly admitted to himself, he may have actually put there.

Everything snapped back into focus when she realized that his hand had stilled on her ribcage and his own laughter had stopped, replaced in fact by eyes that were wide and intensely green and parted lips that seemed to hang in a suspended “O” above her.

She reached her hand between them to rest on top of his, her brows knitting together as she whispered, “Hey, what happened? Is everything okay?”

It took a moment for her words to pierce his consciousness, for his head to twitch from side to side, life seeming to creep back into his eyes. He smiled down at her as he squeezed her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing her knuckles softly before he rubbed them against his cheek.

“Everything is more than okay. Promise.”

He could have gone on, could have given her a big speech about how happy he was that she was here, or marvel at the fact that she was in his bed, or thank her for not having a panic attack when, just weeks into their relationship, he had stumbled over words that eventually got him to inviting her to the Halpert end-of-summer Backyard Bash that encompassed Larisa's birthday and his nephew's birthday and his parent's anniversary into one ridiculous party that typically ended with someone going to the hospital.

But he didn’t have to. It was the look in his eyes that said it all, that said thank you and I love you and Having you here is the happiest I’ve ever been. She closed her lips into a warm smile as her free hand left her side to cup his cheek, her thumb tracing his jawline as her eyes spoke back, Me too.

They met in the middle, his lips soft against hers, as he eventually settled atop her, their bodies flush down to the abdomen, where his legs still straddled her waist. Their kisses spoke volumes that words couldn’t match, as soft, wet sounds encompassed their small bubble, the one that formed around Jimmy Halpert’s childhood bed.

Her hands were stealing up into his hair when a less than subtle knock on the door frame, accompanied by, “Alright, love birds, enough baby makin’. Burgers are hitting the grill, and Pete has the volleyball net basically functioning, so let’s go!” had his body jerking backwards, his own hand nervously brushing through his hair as his face deepened to a crimson.

Larisa waggled her eyebrows in Jim’s direction

“See what I mean? One of them is always playing camp-out by the door, Beesly. You sure you’re really ready to have your entire life invaded by the Halperts?”

Her hands made it to his hair this time, pulling him into a fierce kiss that actually stole his breath.

“Absolutely, I am.”

--

Being back in her own childhood bedroom shouldn’t have been this weird, but as Pam sat against the headboard, pulling her knees to her chest and resting her cheek atop them, something just felt off.

Her parents certainly pulled out all the stops, making a meal full of her “favorites,” though in the three years that she had lost, her mother’s homemade tater-tot casserole sure had been bumped down on that list. The red velvet cake was tasteless, but she would never admit that.

As she brushed her teeth, and washed her face carefully around the bandages, the lighting in the bathroom she had shared growing up with Penny was too bright, the patterns on the shower curtain too overwhelming, the smells of shampoo and air freshener too much.

It was all part of her healing brain, and she knew that.

She just wished she didn’t feel so out of place in her own home.

When Penny knocked and let herself in, sitting gingerly on the back corner of Pam’s full, she toyed with a loose thread on the comforter before muttering, “So this is weird, huh?”

Pam raised her eyebrows, exhaling, finding solace in the first bit of real empathy she’d seen since arriving.

“Totally,” she giggled, watching her sister’s lips turn up, too. “I mean, the last time I was here, I was…”

The whole memories floating back thing was still very, very abstract. These were things she had lived through, and they were trickling in without warning, which was kind of rude. Flashing images of her sister’s graduation day, fireworks in the park on a recent Fourth of July, seeing those two strange people that she worked with--Angela and Dwight?--canoodling on a backyard picnic table. If she had to make a puzzle from the past three years of her life, it would look like a deformed piece of Swiss cheese.

Now, though, she wasn’t caught so off guard. The memory that was slowly returning happened in this very room, as it was, a story that not so long ago had been rehashed in her hospital room. Penny and Pam on Pam’s bed. Penny consoling Pam.

Melissa.

Roy had told her the story, but it wasn’t one that she had locked down anywhere, so she had chosen to accept and believe and tuck away facts as opposed to actual memories.

But now, it was flowing back like a steady stream. Backwards, but still piecing itself together.

She was upset at Penny, because Penny was going to help her cancel the wedding.

Running down the driveway of the house she shared with Roy. Him chasing after, shirtless, still pulling on his jeans.

The zipper was stuck.

“Pammy, c’mon, Pammy, I’m--just, don’t get in the car. Please! Pammy!”

Walking through the door with a surprise dinner. His favorite take-out. He’d had a long week, and seemed distant. Maybe this would help cheer him up.

The heels in the doorway should have been a dead give away. The black pumps that were so far out of her league that she would’ve fallen just looking at them.

It was the noises that had her concerned at first, as she made her way down the hallway to their bedroom, floating on hardwood, dreamlike in her movements. Grunting? Why was he grunting? Roy hadn’t worked out since high school, at least. And working out in the bedroom? That was odd.

Almost as odd as the long moans that were now filling the spaces above her head, floating around her, seeming to pick her up and carry her the rest of the way down the hall.

Standing in the doorway to their bedroom, with her eyes on the scene, didn’t actually jog her into reality, either, though. Roy was moving over someone, clearly. Her leg was being held high up on his shoulder, his face was buried in her neck, her hands were clawing down his sweaty back. She only knew that her mouth was agape by the sudden intake of air.

Her ears drowned in expletives and erotic ambience, but it wasn’t until the other woman, whose hair was jet black and whose eyes were lined in thick, dark makeup, opened her eyes and locked eyes with Pam, the sheer lack of guilt replaced by the quirk of an eyebrow, that it finally all hit her like a truck.

Penny was staring at her, watching the way that Pam’s face contorted with the wave of remembrance. At the end of it all, she let out a simple, Huh, shrugged her shoulders, and sank into her pillow.

“Wow. I stayed with him after that? Seriously?”

She eyed Penny, doing her best to keep the embarrassment at bay as her kid sister joined her against her pillows, their knees bent, heads pressed together. Penny linked her fingers through her sister’s.

“Well, the good news is, it’s over now. Right?”

Penny squeezed, and Pam felt overcome with emotion, at the lack of I told you so’s and the way that her sister was growing up.

She squeezed back, turning her head to offer Penny a thankful smile.

“Jim was right. I do deserve better.”

Penny’s laugh was hearty, so much so that she rolled over onto her side to face Pam.

“Jim’s right about a lot of things, big sis,” she offered, once her laughter abated.

All Pam could do was nod in agreement, suddenly feeling a pang of loss for his absence.

Penny stood suddenly, pulling her cell from her pocket as she motioned that she’d be back, leaving Pam alone in her thoughts. She closed her eyes, letting the soft waves crash around her.

The memories she had were few and far between, but as she pulled the thread that stitched them together, some things were beginning to have clearer edges than before. It was an interesting patchwork that begun to weave itself, with jagged memories that were crawling back joining truths she had observed in her time since being awake. She let herself stew, in acceptance and regret and contentedness, as the life that she had lost did its best to return to her.

A sudden warm washed over her as she continued to play detective, making assumptions and realizations as the final quilt was coming together more clearly. Things like Cut Halpert a break and He cares about you so much, Pam and soft shell crab and Seven months from now. It wasn’t coming back, but it was making sense with a clarity that she hadn’t had since awakening from the accident.

Her eyes opened again on a soft rapping against her door, her sister’s voice there to greet her with an unexpected, “Hey, Pammy? Someone’s here to see you, if you want the company.”

She knew, even before he crossed the threshold.

--

It killed Jim that he couldn’t be there to help her home from the hospital, to pack up the room and say goodbye to the nurses and make sure that Pam was adjusting well. He wanted to hear the doctor’s orders, wanted to know just what to do in any situation that might present itself. What if her headaches wouldn’t go away? Was dizziness normal? When would her follow up appointments be? Was she cleared to go back to work anytime soon? How “easy” was she supposed to take it?

But that wasn’t his place, really. In her mind at least, he wasn’t home anymore. He didn’t have the job of keeping her safe and looking over her while she recovered. Granted, he hadn’t actually had the opportunity to do any of that yet, but it was on his long list of Things to Do With Pam. Maybe not in this capacity, per say. But his chest still felt tight as the hours ticked by on the clocks at Dunder Mifflin, Inc. and he sat idly by, knowing that she was on her way home.

To her parent’s house. Not home.

He had every mind to call her or text her or at least text Penny to check in, but he still didn’t know what the boundaries were here. A few days ago, she wouldn’t let him in her room, and then days after that she remembered his tie and was hugging him and crying joyfully in his arms. The line was blurrier than a sidewalk strip during a DUI test.

So when Penny called, he was halfway out the doors, struggling to pull on his gym shoes as she gave him directions to Will and Helene’s home.

It still felt a little bit wrong, as he toed his shoes off at the front door and shook Mr. Beesly’s hand and declined a drink from Mrs. Beesly. After his family’s barbecue, Pam had mentioned having dinner at her parent’s place as soon as possible. This wasn’t exactly what he’d had in mind.

She looked decidedly uncomfortable in her own bed, and that only had his heart aching more, to know that she was home but still hurting.

She sat fully up, her eyes opened, as he pushed the door inward, his own wary gaze settled by the sense of calm that seemed to wash over her face when she saw him. She smiled warmly and patted the bed next to her as she scooted farther in, closer to the wall, inviting him in as she signaled for Penny to close the door.

“I don’t know, Pammy. House rules dictate that if a boy is in your room, the door has to stay open,” Penny chided.

“Oh please. Roy never made it past the living room. Mom and dad clearly dropped the ball with you after I left for college. Besides, it’s not like Jim has impure intentions, right?”

Penny laughed, smiling quietly at her sister and passing a playful, “Behave, you two,” before the door clicked closed.

Jim rubbed his hands along his thighs, doing his best to slow his beating heart from pumping out of his chest. He tripped over his own words, not quite knowing where to begin when he was still trying to pull his grip around the fact that he was sitting in bed with Pam, his So, how are you feeling, uh, you know, being back at home? sounding choked and far away as he continued to rub at his jeans.

Even more strange was the calmality in her voice, the way her eyes were clear and her hands weren’t shaking and her smile was small but steady.

“Umm...it’s weird,” she admitted with a short chuckle. “Definitely weird.”

She hesitated, he noticed as he peeked a glance over to her and watched her eyes wander, her lip bite between her teeth.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah,” she breathed finally. “Yeah, actually, I was just talking to Penny--the last time I remember being here was when...it was when I caught Roy cheating on me.”

It was certainly news to him, but news that weighed him down like a ton of bricks was being unloaded on top of his chest.

She didn’t really shed tears as she told him not so much detail about that night, the one six months after she’d gotten the job at Dunder Mifflin. The one that had her crashing through the front doors of her childhood home to be consoled by her mother and sister.

It was the week he had started working at Dunder Mifflin.

And as she played out the details, everything in his life began to click into place.

“I remember you asking me out to lunch, and god did I need the break. You gave that to me. For that--what, hour?--that we spent out of the office, I actually forgot why I had been so sad, Jim. You did that. You brought me out of a kind of dark place without even knowing it.”

It was all clear now: the sadness in her eyes after his first day, the dark shadows and the way her shoulders hung low, so contrary to their initial meeting; he had wanted to say something, to ask her if she was okay, but he didn’t know how.

She shrugged, having talked herself silly for almost ten minutes while he watched and listened in awe.

Drawing her gaze from her lap to his eyes nervously, she giggled, kicking his foot with her own.

“Come on, say something.”

“I...I don’t even really know where to begin,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck. “Pam, I…”

It was those eyes that spoke his every intention. Hurt. Sorrow. Longing.

When he was suddenly asking, “Can I...can I hug you?” she didn’t hesitate before tucking her head into his chest, letting him envelop her while she shimmied her arms between his back and the headboard. She breathed in his scent while they sat there, her bent knees tucked atop his outstretched legs, his hands warm and firm on her back, his chin tucked firmly to the top of her head.

“We’re together, aren’t we?”

It caught him so off-guard that his breath hitched, his arms stiffening around her fragile body. He was panicking, internally, preparing for a repeat of that night, of I can’t and You have no idea what your friendship means to me. Of You’re really nice, Jim, but I just don’t know you anymore. He prepared with tears hitting the top of her head as he did his best to solidify their final moments before he whispered Yes.

The silence was a blanket, nestling them into a little cocoon of uncertainty. It wasn’t that she wanted to let him stew, because aside from the rapidness of his heart thrumming against her temple, she was fully unaware of the turmoil that those few minutes carried for him. She only noticed that he held her more tightly, that his breathing was more shallow, that he was seeming to hold in a sob by the way these little chirps were catching in his throat.

It was when the tears fell from his eyes to hit her skin that she knew she needed to say something, needed to do something. So she began to sit up, biting her lip when his arms tried to hold her for just one more second.

The pain in his eyes was so real, so cutting, that he looked almost hollow as she met his eyes.

So she closed her hands over his, squeezing tightly.

“I can’t…”

And he was breaking, his eyes squeezing, his teeth biting into his lip.

“...remember, Jim.”

His breaths quickened, pushing past his teeth no matter how hard he tried to settle himself down.

“But I can feel it.”

He kept his eyes clenched shut, the drowning in his ears becoming suddenly clear when her hand was on his chest, her fingers firm, but then lightly scratching. He opened his eyes then, meeting her gaze with blurry obstruction.

“I kind of...I put some things together. I can't remember, Jim. I don’t remember being with you, but I remember these little snippets of being with you, and I...I’m so sorry that this is hurting you. I’m so sorry that I can’t remember.”

She was breaking, for the first time, because he was barely holding it together. There was something about the way that he was reacting, like she was about to leave and he would literally shatter, that made this so much more real. Before she could take a breath, he had her in a tight grip, back against his chest, but with almost no room to breathe. Somehow, she found it comfortable, with her fingers wedged between their bodies and her ribs pressed crushingly.

“Don’t, don’t you ever apologize for that,” he whispered, his words shaky as he mumbled into her hair. “That’s...I just...you’re alive, and you’re safe, and you're here...that’s all that matters, okay? Don’t you worry about me.”

She buried her nose against his chest, feeling the warmth spread from the inside out.