“Jimmy...this is Pam.”

His sister’s words squealed across telephone wires from somewhere in his parent’s basement. Pam had left not ten minutes ago, after a weekend that was, despite almost seventy-two hours spent with only one another, not long enough by far. Though he’d wanted to stay on the phone with her while she drove back to Scranton, he also wanted her to drive safely, and after the promises of Call me when you get home and still not enough kisses goodbye, she had disappeared over the horizon, five long days standing between him and the next time she would be back in his arms.

He couldn’t have wiped the smile, stretching from ear to ear, from his face if he tried.

Still on his Pam high, still reeling from the fact that she had been here, had said I love you, was finally ready for this, he had to tell someone, and he had dialed Larisa’s number without a second thought. It had taken him all of a few minutes to dish the important details of what he was now dubbing “The Best Weekend of My Life.”

Her only response, through a smile that he could imagine from across New England, were Jimmy… this is Pam.

Coincidentally, they were his only thoughts, too, and would be for the remainder of his week.

While he typed up expense reports and heard the Stamford receptionist answer, all he heard was Dunder Mifflin, this is Pam.

While doing his weekly grocery shopping, the brand of fabric softener read not as Snuggle, but as Beesly.

When he found a tube of her chapstick roll out from underneath the passenger seat of his car, he had a momentary desire to press the strawberry goop to his lips. He settled for pocketing the tube instead, a smile curling his lips at the thought of being able to give it back to her in just a few short days.

Because this was Pam. And it was Jim. And they were finally at the start.

--

Spontaneous memory recovery was common, the doctors told him. But it didn’t necessarily mean anything.

He had to hide his face, beat down the spectacular joy that lit up his cheeks and made his smile blinding, when she’d said You totally kicked it in with you foot, when that good for nothing doctor took his hopes and dreams in the palm of her hand and flattened them, all with a smile on her face.

Pam could wake up in the morning with certain events suddenly back in tact, as if they’d never left, she’d told him. They could come at any moment in time, truly, being triggered by anything and everything under the sun. But in the end, she still thought it was 2003. She still thought she was engaged to Roy.

Her memories of Jim were still limited to bedside chats and that one fleeting moment on the golf course.

It was frustrating, really, these moments when he saw the sparkle behind her eyes, the one he only saw in those private moments in the office when they shared an inside joke, or watched in awe while a prank they’d initiated on Dwight unfolded, or he comforted her after a fight with Roy and he watched the flame that had been extinguished reignite.

It was the same spark that had lit behind her eyes from the moment she’d shown up on his doorstep almost two months ago, telling him that she loved him, starting their life from the beginning that had no end.

He’d seen it, sitting in this hospital room beside a woman whose head was supposedly vacant of him. That’s what made this all so frustrating. He couldn’t very well latch onto her shoulders and shake her until she remembered, and they’d already put roadblocks at the idea of simply revealing everything to her in order to not impede her recovery. So, for the umpteenth time in this never ending saga that was Jim and Pam, he would wait.

She was asleep, and although it was 8:30 on a Friday night, he didn’t dare venture out onto the already scarce Scranton nightlife scene while the dreams she was having bore the potential to bring her back to him.

The Phillies were up 4-to-1 against the Mets, but he couldn’t even enjoy the domination of Ryan Howard and Shane Victorino tonight. Forcing the heels of his hands into his eye sockets, he took a deep breath, opening them only to find one pair sleek shoes and a contrasting dirty pair of Converse edging dangerously close to his own chair. He knew who bore each before his eyes had so much as met their ankles.

“I did a little snooping and called in some back up.”

Penny Beesly was nothing if not forward and vocal about her opinions, he had come to realize. Unfortunately, so was his kid sister, Larisa. Her raised eyebrow and crossed arms resembled an all too familiar look that usually followed a stupid decision of his. But her eyes spoke volumes of sadness and sympathy, true concern for her shell of a brother who was essentially becoming part of the stiff hospital chair that he occupied.

His smile was sheepish and defeated as he glanced back and forth between this odd scene from somewhere deep in the Twilight Zone, where he was being cornered by both Pam’s sister and his own.

“Hey big brother,” came his sister’s voice, one so typically riddled with sarcasm and insults, but was now comforting, if not sad. It was scary how, the older they got, the more she morphed into a punk-rock version of their mother.

Larisa slunk in slow motion to the chair connected to his, as if sudden movements would pop his bubble or something. As her body finally slumped into the chair, Penny was already turning away.

“I’m going to make a coffee run. Anyone need caffeine?”

“I’ll take a black, if you’re asking,” Larisa said with a smile and a shrug.

“Sure thing. Jim?”

He wasn’t thirsty, but he needed something to do with his hands besides flip his cell phone open and closed again to reread the text messages that he’d saved over the past two months.

I know I just left your place, and I’m only at the stop sign at the end of your street, but I just wanted to say I missed you. Because I can. So, miss you.

This Friday? Absolutely :) Please. I already can’t wait :)

God, you’re such a dork. Of course I think cheesy bread is superior to normal breadsticks. I’m not a Communist.

:) :) :) I love you too, Jim <3

Text hearts are NOT cheesy, you fun sucker <3 <3 <3

Hey, can you pick up butter on your way over? I’m out.

Ok, drive safe please. See you soon :)

The last one taunted him, menacingly so, but he kept it all the same.

“Uhm, yeah, sure. I’ll just take whatever she’s having. Thanks, Penny.”

Penny nodded curtly with a stiff smile before turning on brisk heels to somewhere far enough away to give them their space.

The blips of machines, groans and moans from patients, the buzzing of the overhead fluorescence, and Harry Kalas’ voice congested the 8 inch gap between Jim and his sister.

“So...tell me. What’s going on in that head of yours, Jimmy?”

Her posture mimicked his in the way that they each had legs spread apart, elbows leaning on knees; she differed in the sense that her head was held higher than his was, but really, she couldn’t blame him. Rocking to the side, her knee tapped Jim’s, encouraging him to glance up from where his head had come to rest below his shoulders. His eyes, sunken and somber, were so pained, having gone back and forth between hope and soul crushing blows, that she wondered how they were still rooted inside of his skull.

His smile was attempted but failed sheepishness, fleeting, before his lungs emptied and his head shook between his knees.

“This...this fuckin’ sucks, Larisa.”

She tried her hardest to ignore the way his chuckle was painted black, but she couldn’t. It devastated her to see her big brother this way, after all they’d already been through.

She covered his jean clad knee with her hand, squeezing him gently, chuckling under the feel of his bony skin. It didn’t matter how much “muscle” he claimed to put on, he would always be Skeletor in her eyes.

“Yeah? Keep going.”

He knew what she was doing, knew exactly what she was doing. But if this was the game plan, maybe it was what he needed.

They’d been like this since they were kids. Tom and Pete had buddied up long before Jim was born, so when Larisa came along, he felt the urge as her big brother to form a pact, and consequently, to always protect her. The bond they’d formed was insurmountable to most. Whenever one or the other was feeling sad or mad (in their younger days) or frustrated or misunderstood (the older they grew), they’d find somewhere quiet, and just let it all out. There were no interruptions in the stream of words that spilled and tumbled in anger or anguish, heartbreak or resentment. Aside from the occasional, “Mhm? Keep going,” their ears were a sounding board for one another.

It was truly only in those desperate times when this call to action was needed. When his girlfriend cheated on him in college. When mom and dad didn’t support her decision to pursue writing instead of her lifelong love of medicine.  

When Pam had left him utterly broken in the bullpen of Dunder Mifflin, Inc.

With his sister’s eyes still pleading, only the crack of the bat resounding behind him, he gave in.

“I just...I feel so helpless, ‘Riss. Which makes me feel terrible, because Pam is literally lying in there, actually helpless right now. I have no right to feel that way. No right. But I can’t...I can’t do anything. I can’t do anything about it. I can’t make her feel less helpless. Everyone keeps telling me to just be there and be strong and that I’m doing the right thing, but...every time her eyes go back to the past, it’s like...should I even be here? I mean, she wants...she wants Roy. She’s made that clear. Or, at least she keeps bringing him up.”

He shrugged. His hands wrung between his knees, complexion fading from peach into white and different shades of red.

“But she thinks they’re still together, so, it technically makes sense. It just, it just sucks, Larisa. I put in all of this time, waiting and hoping and stealing these little moments with her, these itty bitty little moments that anyone else would be crazy to stockpile, but god did I stockpile them. I filled a teapot with them for god's sake. I organized them into tiny little files labeled Pam and I let them overtake everything else in my life because nothing was more important to me than seeing her smile or making her laugh.”

He was speaking emphatically now, his hands maneuvering in the dull air to create pictures of the love he had for the woman who had succumbed to exhaustion in the next room.

“I don’t even know why I’m speaking in past tense. Nothing is more important to me than her. Nothing. I still do all of those things, too. I put another picture into the file cabinet today. She had her fingers covering her mouth while she giggled, because she was embarrassed about making a dirty joke. And it was so...it was so Pam, ‘Rissa. Her eyes had these little flecks of gold in them, and I just...I can’t stop.”

His eyes left for a moment, walked back to that memory, and she could see those same flecks of gold in his everchanging green. Still, she waited, listened.

“God, there was this...this point where the Pam parts of my brain were overriding the ‘important’ things in life. I couldn’t walk down the damn chip aisle at Wegman’s without purposely looking for Sun Chips. Didn’t want to smell the fabric softener on my own clothes because it would send me back to this stupid little comment she’d made once. But at the same time, I was forgetting to do things like, like shower and eat and do my job, because all that mattered to me was Pam. All that matters to me is Pam.”

The desperation in his eyes was breaking her heart.

“And she...she was telling me today about...God, I can’t even say it.”

His eyes found the sky then, a glass overcoming them, falling silently down his cheeks and onto those same jean clad knees that she’d been squeezing.

“She’s devastated by all of this, Larisa. She thinks...with the cuts and the band-aids...I couldn't even stop myself from telling her how wrong she was, how beautiful she is. And I can’t...I can’t do anything to fix it, damnit. I’m not a doctor or a nurse or a goddamn wizard who can wave a magic wand. I just want to...make this all go away for her. The pain and the bruises and the frustration. I can see it, too. I can see how frustrated this all has her, and it isn’t good for this damn healing process. It isn’t good for her. She shouldn’t have to be confused and frustrated on top of being sad and scared and...she just looks so little, Larisa. So, so little. I just want to sit on that bed and pull her into my arms and hold her until this all goes away. But I don’t know. I genuinely do. Not. Know. What to do. If...if she wants to be with Roy...”

Larisa watched as her brother shrugged, as his head hung lower than his shoulders, his hands clasped between his knees, almost as if he was one of those animatronics from Chuck E. Cheese, closing his performance just as he’d begun.

Their eyes met, equally glassy; Larisa truly did feel deeply for her brother, this man who had spent so much of his adult life doing nothing but love the woman in the room across the hall. She could see just how much this was genuinely tearing him apart. Covering his hands, she gave him an encouraging squeeze.

“But Jimmy...this is Pam.”

He bit his lip, almost as if to say I know, or to bite back more tears, maybe.

“You guys have come too damn far to be anything but happy, Jim. I can’t let you give up now. I can’t let you give up ever, but...right now, I think, as hard as this might sounds, she needs you the most. She needs your love and your security, and she needs you in her corner for when her world is falling apart, which is pretty much her new version of normal. She might not remember you the way that you remember her, but that’s exactly why you need to be here, and not groveling or feeling sorry for yourself. Tell me that you feel sorry for yourself. Lay it all here when you can’t take it anymore. But when it comes to Pam? You need to do everything you can to remind her what you two had, Jimmy. What you still have.”

In their moment of on the verge breakdowns, Penny and her cardboard coffee carrier served as their saving grace.

“I don’t mean to eavesdrop, but I second all of that,” she offered along with two steaming styrofoam cups.

In all of her graceful form, Penny dropped her body less than elegantly into the chair next to Larisa.

“I can only do so much, Jim,” Penny continued, “and believe me, she does not want to hear about how little I think of Roy. I’ve given it to her since the beginning.”

Penny chuckled darkly, taking a hearty swig from her own coffee as Larisa sipped at hers and Jim picked absently at the styrofoam.

“I just wish she could remember, I don’t know, something. These little flashes are almost...demoralizing when she doesn’t make any connections. And the discouragement trumps any celebration of progress. It’s like this never-ending cycle of bullshit.”

“Well, you got something out of her today, didn’t you?”

He shrugged, tracing the letters that spelled out CAUTION: HOT, and wondered who the poor son of a bitch was that couldn’t predict the temperature of a cup of coffee.

“Don’t be so modest, Jim. You did that. You helped her to connect those dots. It was small, but it was something.”

“Well...yeah, but--”

“No. No buts. Whatever you did, it obviously triggered something. Maybe you just keep going down that road? See where it takes her?”

His mind drifted to their conversations of Dunder Mifflin and that’s what she said and, of all people, Michael Scott. To crossword puzzles and mini golf and his big feet and the promise of flash cards. Suddenly, the wheels began to turn.

Penny hadn’t seen his eyes this bright since Pam had returned her Is he cute? text with a picture of the two of them making goofy faces at the camera.

Larisa had offered to take him home and spend the night, but he declined politely, promising to make time to share at least one meal together the next day. It was for the best; she wouldn’t have gotten a wink of sleep by the way the lights in Jim’s apartment lit up his windows well into the dawn, scissors and glue working more frivolously than they ever had in his elementary days.

He returned to the hospital after a good night’s sleep, a shower, a phone call to confirm plans for lunch with Larisa (“No offense, but I’m not about to be conscious enough for breakfast.” “Larisa, it’s 9:30.” “And? I’m going back to bed. Goodnight”), and a quick check that his art project was securely tucked into the back pocket of his jeans. After greeting the morning nurses--offering to grab a coffee or a morning bagel for the ladies on shift--he did a quick peek into the window of her closed door, his eyes met immediately with the intense blonde that covered the back of Penny’s head. When blue eyes replaced golden locks in the snap of her neck, she only shook her head twice, left right, left right, before his vertebrae snuggled into cookie-cutter forms in his waiting room chair. It was close to eleven when Penny’s heels click-clacked the tile floor.

Penny met Jim’s big, round, hopeful eyes--Bambi eyes, she and Pam would call them--with a sigh.

“Sorry, she doesn’t really want to see anyone right now.”

His nod was understanding, the fire that lit his bones around midnight still present, still lingering, This is Pam his mantra for the day.

“That’s fine. I can understand that.” Before She’s probably tired from having people in and out of her room all day could finish his string of thoughts, Penny cut him off.

“Have I mentioned how much I hate Roy, Jim? Just, remind me, have I mentioned it?”

Her sarcasm was biting, but it made him laugh all the same, albeit bated, so as not to become the victim of her next beheading.

“I, uh, I think you may have mentioned it once or twice.”

“Good, I won’t have to give you the earload this time. I really fucking hate him, Jim.”

It clicked, then, that maybe Pam’s mood had less to do with exhaustion and more to do with the man whose presence was already darkening the color of the room.

With this realization, he pushed against the arm rests with both hands to lift his lanky body from the chair, took a deep breath, and cocked a smile as a new surge of confidence lit through his veins. Knocking lightly with just the knuckle of his pointer finger, he poked his head into the small opening of the door, meeting eyes who were fighting between somber and rage, darting back and forth so quickly, he wondered if she’d actually seen him. But when those same eyes snapped to the middle, eyebrows finding a middle ground, all movement ceased.

“Well, someone looks like she could use a morning pick-me-up.”

Her eyes softened at the corners, and although her brows still told a tale of apathy, the way that her lips twitched said otherwise.

This is Pam.

His steps weren’t tentative as he sought the chair next to her bed, his lips didn’t turn down when her enthusiasm for his presence wasn’t shared. He simply reached into his back pocket, produced a small purple box, and casually set it in her lap.

There was that smile.

“Multiplication cards?” she asked with a skeptical chuckle as she turned the box over in her hands for further inspection.

Her brows still met in the middle, but now they were turned up, just so slightly, teetering on the edge of annoyed and getting there.

“I never go back on a promise, Beesly. I was serious: I‘m genuinely worried about your third grade math skills being lost up there. We probably should have started this five minutes ago, honestly.”

And there was that laugh.

This is Pam.

She dumped the cards carefully from the box, still stiff and square and new, before handing him the deck, watching intently as his deft fingers shuffled the large cardboard.

“You’re shuffling them?”

“Obviously,” he drawled, exaggerating the way that his eyes closed and his head tipped with his words. “Come on, Pam. They put these things in order. How are you supposed to make any sort of gains if zero-times-zero is followed immediately by zero-times-one?”

Her eyes closed with a smirk, chest heaving just slightly with her laughter.

“Alright. Case in point. Continue. I wouldn’t want to disrupt the master at work.”

“Thank you. That’s all I ask.”

He gave the cards one more good toss around, letting his eyes wander only for a moment to the pile of magazines with titles like Total Bride and In-Style Wedding that sat beside her bed, looking like they’d been haphazardly tossed aside.

“We’ll start you off easy here.” Holding up a card with large block print displaying 1 x 2 = ? he continued his serious schtick, complete with animation in his wide eyes and dynamic brows. She perched her chin between thumb and pointer as if deep in thought before offering the obvious answer, only breaking character to breathe out a giggle when he wiped his brow and uttered Phew.

“Oh god, I’m not sure if you can handle this one. We went pretty tough pretty quickly here. I don’t want to stress you out.”

With deep breathing and wandering eyes to boot, he flashed her the next card. She mirrored his shock, inhaling sharply and clutching her chest.

“Oh god, I was never very good with sixes. Six times four?”

“It’s okay, Pam. You can do this, I believe in you.”

“Okay, okay. So, six plus six, carry the one…” she scratched her pointer finger in the air between them, scraping out what was clearly meant to be a math equation.

There was the girl he knew.

This is Pam.

They tumbled through a few more cards before he flipped her latest (twelve times seven; tricky, but she made it) to the bottom of the deck. Her eyes scrunched around her nose when the next card presented itself. He bit the inside of his lip to contain his reaction.

“Hmm? Something wrong, Beesly? It’s not another six again, is it? Listen, if you’d like to phone a friend, I won’t judge, promise.”

She shook her head, trying to clear what had snapped from a steady stream of sarcasm straight into confusion.

“Not exactly. It’s more of an...annoyed looking black man.”

Ahh. So she’d gotten Stanley first. Not the most ideal pick, but he’d make do.

The grin that bit the corners of his cheeks was so innately smug that it tickled her somewhere deep inside.

“Correct. Now, can you remember his name?”

Now it was ignorance that twisted her brows upward as she cocked her head, staring into the eyes of the man who clearly hadn’t wanted his picture taken at that exact moment.

“Am I...supposed to?”

“Well,” he began, his confidence fading into a more shy demeanor, “that’s eventually the hope.”

She watched her fingers dance in front of her face, reaching out delicately to pluck the card from his hands. Holding it between casted and uncasted fingers, she ran her fingertips over the edges, noticing the smooth transition from card to Scotch tape. There was a hint of purple curled at the edges of the picture where he’d assumedly tried glue at first. Flipping the card gingerly, so as not to disturb the disgruntled face of the man any more than he already was, she found more paper, this time met with scrawled handwriting that was eerily familiar.

Stanley Hudson

Paper Salesman

Very specific sense of humor

Big heart

(But also cheating on his wife...and cheating on that woman, too, probably)

She grabbed the pile of cards, sifting through the next several, only to be met with the faces of people who sat at desks and were surrounded by office supplies. Her eyes began to well, but words beat her to it.

“Are these...Jim? I can’t even…”

“So, these are the people we work with,” he cut her off, wanting to halt any and all signs of tears before they could grow. “I figured you might think multiplication was too easy, once your skills all came rushing back. I had to throw in a challenge for you somewhere.”

He shrugged, eyes turning sheepish as his grin turned sideways.

She was in his arms unexpectedly, having thrust her body across the bed as far as her general balance would allow. Taken off guard, he scooted to the edge of the chair quickly, catching her body as it clung to his, hard.

It probably wasn’t intentional, he knew, that her nose wound up buried in the crook of his neck, that her breath was comfortingly warm on his throat. Not intentional at all. But as her whispered thank you etched itself into his skin, he squeezed her just a little bit tighter.

They alternated between silly math and Dunder Mifflin employee trading cards, covering Stanley (“How many affairs has he had?” “We don’t know, Pam. We truly do not know,”), Angela (“This is the one you were telling me about, isn’t it? You were right, she does look uptight,”) and Andy (“So, technically we work with him, but he--” “He did something. He had to leave. He did something, Jim. I swear it,”) before there was a knock at the door. The smell of burgers and fries consumed her senses before her eyes rested on a girl that reminded her strikingly of Jim.

“I was told I might find you in here.”

Pam watched Jim’s body turn and his eyes grow, meeting the faded jeans and dark hoodie of the girl in the doorway.

“I was promised a lunch date, but I’m happy to third wheel. I’m glad I brought extra!”

As a second chair was situated at her bedside, Pam eyed the woman hesitantly, watching her pull boxes of French fries, burgers, and chicken nuggets from the grease laden bag before speaking again.

“God, Jim, no need to be rude. Sorry. I’m Larisa, Jim’s sister.”

When her hand met the outstretched palm of her new visitor, a sigh of relief took Pam by surprise.

“So, what have you two kids been up to today? I hope my brother hasn’t been boring you to death. He has that effect on people.”

Pam giggled, fingering the deck of cards that she still possessed before Larisa, mouth already stuffed with fries, motioned at the buffet she’d set up.

“Oh, help yourselves by the way. Technically speaking, I could finish this all by myself, but I’d rather not have to do that, or we might end up with matching beds here, Pam.”

Jim and Pam were happy to busy their mouths with McDonald’s, sharing a glance as Larisa plucked his deck of cards from the tabletop.

“What are these?”

She turned them over in her hand, flipping the Stanley card on its back and reading with intent before she moved on to the next.

“Oh, your brother made me flash cards. These are people we work with, apparently. I kind of remember this guy. He’s quirky, I know that much,” she mused, pulling the Andy card from the middle of the discard pile.

Larisa gave Jim a sideways glance, a grin creeping towards him, before she took the unread pile of cards.

“Aww. That’s kind of awesome. So what does the Jim card say? ‘Big nose, dork, enjoys long walks to the fridge for cheap beer?’”

Pam giggled, her eyes apologizing to Jim amidst the shared laughter between herself and Larisa, all the while wondering if there was a Jim card and if there was, what it would tell her about him that she didn’t already know.

“Thanks, Rissa. I really appreciate the vote of confidence.”

Jim rolled his eyes before plucking a handful of fries from the soggy cardboard box.

They chatted idly, Pam asking Larisa about herself while sharing the few details of her wedding that she had planned.

“So, wow, you and Roy, huh? Almost seven years? Damn, girl. Show me your ways. I haven’t been able to lock down a man for more than a few months without finding a problem.”

Pam’s laughter was awkward now as she reflected on her relationship with Roy, specifically the way that he had left her this morning.

“Trust me, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows. But, I guess when you have something that’s lasted this long, you fight it out, you know?”

Larisa nodded, sipping on her Sprite.

“That’s true, I guess. But, I mean, I have a friend who is still dating her high school sweetheart, and all she does is complain. He’s stuck in the glory days and she just wants to grow up and move on, but they’ve been together for so long that, like, she feels bad leaving him, and she doesn’t know how she would start over, so she stays. Good for you guys though, honestly.”

For the first time since Larisa had stumbled into her room, Pam’s eyes found her lap. Idly picking at a loose thread in her cast, she felt her lips produce a mumbled, Yeah, thanks, before eyeing Jim. His eyes showed concern, and he seemed to be trying to communicate with a look that her body understood when she was suddenly nodding her head, and he was taking the hint.

“Hey ‘Riss, do you want to do me a solid and get me a coffee? This Coke isn’t going to cut it.”

She nodded once before gathering the mass of fast food containers to dispose of on the way out, fully intending to take her sweet time.

“Absolutely. You want anything, Pam?”

“No, I’m good, thanks.”

With the door clicked shut, Pam’s eyes found her lap again.

“You wanna talk about it?”

The voice that met her ears was warm and soothing, not at all like the one that had clipped her on the way out this morning. Her head panged with I don’t want to talk about this anymore, but her heart was more trusting, insisting that this man with the flashcards be privileged to her secrets. It took her a minute, but once the words began, they poured out like a flood.

“Roy stopped by today. Kind of early, actually. I thought maybe he wanted to have breakfast with me or something. I had this whole big plan, too. I made Penny bring me all of my bridal magazines, and I was going to have her put some...some cover-up on all of this, and we were going to spend the day together, just me and Roy, you know?”

He simply nodded, his eyes trained on her cheeks, her lips, her eyes as she spoke, seeming to whisper Go on, I’m here.

So she did.

“He was here for like, five minutes, Jim. He stopped by to say hi, ask what the doctors had said, and then told me he was going to the lake with Kenny for the weekend. I mean, seriously?! I’m holed up in the goddamn hospital and he goes to the lake? God!”

As she recounted their argument, line for line, it took everything in his power to quell the redness that was undoubtedly rising in his cheeks. He simply nodded, knowing that he needed to move his body somehow to keep from punching a hole in the wall. When she’d finally finished, her face flushed and cheeks red, they hung in silence while he debated his response.

“You know, Pam, I could feed you a ton of lines about how this is hard on him, too and maybe he just needs some space, but it would all be bullshit.”

She looked genuinely shocked at first, but her expression grew more confident as he continued.

“You’re right. He should be here. Not that I’m not thrilled to spend my entire Saturday hanging out with my favorite receptionist, but I should be having my ass kicked out of this chair right now. So.”

It was his turn to inspect his hands, a hint greasy from his lunch, but otherwise clean. When his eyes found hers again, he could see her struggling to find words, struggling to know what to say. He hadn’t ever been this forward with her about his feelings towards Roy. Aside from telling her to take a chance on something, he vented most of his Roy frustrations to Mark over a Friday night beer. But as he continued to remind himself that This is Pam, and his Pam was surging with a new bought of confidence, he could not, would not let her go back to that place where she was used as a doormat. Before she could get up in her head, he reached across the bed and plucked a bridal magazine from the bedside table.

“So, Beesly, what’s the color scheme?”

She watched as Jim crossed one leg over the other, balancing a floral covered magazine spread between his large hands as he thumbed through the thin pages.

“Huh?”

“Well, what was the big plan for today? Colors? Flowers? Please tell me you’re doing a cake and not one of those weird-o donut contraptions.”

In the strange darkness in which her day had begun, she was finally seeing the light as it cascaded around the man in the chair.

“Well, um...Roy wanted...I guess the colors are blue and gold. Go Cougars, I guess…”

Jim returned her half-hearted fist pump with a look of disgust.

“Oh, god, Pam. You’re really going to let him model your wedding after your high school? Come on, Beesly, I thought I taught you better than that.”

After he produced a few chuckles from somewhere hidden within her, he continued.

“Now, come on. This is the afternoon of the Beesly dream wedding. Consider my your fairy godmother. Hit me with your wishes.”

For the next several hours, they transitioned between magazines, somewhere along the way commandeering a pair of scissors, large paper, and tape. He did the cutting, as her right arm was out of commission, and she stuck to building the collage, arranging flowers and cakes with centerpieces and venues that she wouldn’t be able to afford even if she wasn’t marrying Roy. He focused much of his attention on cutting, but when he snuck glances at the way her poster board was coming to life, he had to smile. This was Pam. 

When her parents arrived in the early evening, Jim wordlessly cleaned up their scraps, shooing her away when she tried to help, motioning for her to visit her parents as he worked silently around them.

After the crowd died down and she was left with a few moments of silence, she shuffled frantically through the deck of cards that he’d left behind, her heart stopping when she landed on the one she’d been looking for.

The face staring back at her was newly familiar, but also not so new. His eyes were pinched shut in this picture, his tongue sticking out to the side through white teeth. It was an extreme close up, so she barely registered the color of his shirt or the bearings of his environment. She’d have to ask him, next time, who had taken the picture. She turned the card over, cautiously, anticipating his own description on bated breath.

James “Jim” Halpert

Pretty decent salesman (when he isn't hanging out at reception)

Expert prankster

Green jelly bean aficionado

Best friend to one Pamela Morgan “Beesly” Beesly.

And don't you forget it ;)