Jim's alarm goes off at 7:15 the following morning, Saturday. Inventory day. He snoozes the alarm and buys himself an extra nine minutes. The bed is inviting and he pulls the covers back up over his shoulders and turns towards the warm body that's next to him. He's still in that place somewhere in between sleep and awake, the place where the dreams and reality can so often get mixed up, but the small figure laying next to him is so warm and solid and real that he knows he's not dreaming.
He buries his nose in curly red hair and inhales. It's nice--soft, and smells like coconut. The woman it belongs to wiggles her body until he's flush against him, and that's nice too. He can feel the soft cotton of the t-shirt that she wore to bed (one of his) agains his bare chest. A nother nice thing. She sighs, stretches a little, and sleepily mumbles into the pillow. "Good morning."
At the sound of her voice, his eyes spring open. He's hit by the realization that it's Katy in his bed and not...someone else. Of course it's Katy in his bed, they'd had plans for the night before and she'd come back to his place after dinner and a movie. She's leaving today, heading home to spend some time with her family for the holidays and that's why she'd stayed over--she'd batted her eyes and whispered suggestively and swore up and down that she didn't mind that he had to get up early for work the next day, she just wanted to spend some quality time with him before she left town for a while. He remembers all of this in the span of a split second and he's jerked out of the half asleep, half awake state he's been in since his alarm went off. The state that made him forget who was in his bed, the state that made him wish it were someone else.
The alarm goes off again, and he really could probably snooze it again and still get to work on time, but he uses it as an excuse to get out of bed. Katy turns towards him and he feels the twisting weight of guilt start to settle in his stomach at the soft smile on her face. Guilt because Katy is sweet and nice and fun and gorgeous and she likes him and wants to be with him, and here he is dreaming that she's someone else.
He pulls a shirt out of his dresser and shrugs it on, then finds his jeans on the floor and steps into them. Katy watches from the bed with a pout on her face. "Do you have to go into work today?"
His voice is muffled as he pulls a hooded sweatshirt over his head. "Yeah, it's inventory day. We have to have it done by the end of the year."
"But it's so close to Christmas...why did your boss put it off so long?" She sounds a little whiny and it grates on his nerves.
"Come on, you've met Michael."
Katy wrinkles her nose. "Yeah. What a freak."
Jim feels a surge of defensiveness towards Michael, for whatever reason. It's nothing that he hasn't said himself, but it feels wrong to have someone who doesn't know Michael insult him. "He's not. He's just...he's just Michael." He sits down on the edge of the bed so that he pull on his socks and shoes. The bed shifts behind him as she crawls up behind him and wraps her arms around his waist. She rests her chin on his shoulder and his guilt gets a little heavier. "Hey," he says as he turns towards her. "When are you headed out of town?"
"Around 9 or so, I guess."
"I don't think we'll be done by then. I'm sorry. Look, have a good Christmas, okay?" Her face is turned down as she nods and he doesn't have to see her expression to know that it's sad. Guilt has settled firmly in his stomach and it prompts him to tilt her chin up so that she can see his face. "Call me when you leave and call me again when you get there, okay?" She smiles and kisses him softly and he doesn't know why but the guilt gets even heavier.
He manages to not dwell on any potential reasons why as he gets a fast food breakfast and makes the drive to the office.
Most of his coworkers are already in the warehouse and are trying to get started by the time he arrives. Michael tries to get everyone involved in some warm up games, but Stanley flat out refuses and Oscar has a system set up that he believes is the most efficient way of getting everything inventoried so everyone splits up starts comparing the numbers on the inventory sheets with the numbers on the shelves.
As he grabs a sheet and a clipboard, he sees Pam descending the stairs into the warehouse with her pink mug in hand. She sees him too and waves, smiling. He waves back and starts to cross the warehouse towards her, intending on telling her about Michael's grade school warm up games or Oscar's "well, actually" but then he feels the leaden weight of guilt again, right in the pit of his stomach. So instead of going to talk to her he lowers his hand and turns away. He doesn't see the way her smile fades or how her eyes get a little sad.
As luck would have it, he winds up on the same row as Kelly. He tries to tune her out but she keeps up a steady stream of chatter and he loses his place at least four times. He takes a few steps sideways in an attempt to put some distance between him and Kelly and focuses on making sure that there's 117 boxes of single table file folders. Kelly's attention shifts to the unfortunate soul on the opposite side of her (Toby) and Jim is finally able to count more than twenty boxes before losing his place.
He gets to 31 when something moves on the other side of the shelf and knocks a small stack boxes to the ground. A few of them pop open and file folders spill out across the floor. As he bends down to pick them up, he sees a pair of stark white Keds in his peripheral vision. "Oh Jim, I'm sorry. Here, let me help you pick these up."
It was Pam, of course. She looks at him tentatively as she starts to gather up the folders and he remembers their conversation from the day before, when she'd asked if he was upset at her. He'd tried to clear things up, make sure that she knew that it wasn't her fault that he'd been distant. It was evident by the expression on her face that she was still a little unsure--probably because of the way he'd avoided her earlier-- so he shoots her a smile and some good-natured ribbing. "God Beesly, such a klutz."
She blushes and he looks away because it's probably the most adorable thing he's ever seen and that's counterproductive to the whole "get over Pam" thing that he's been trying to do for the last week. In his head, he repeats the mantra that he's adopted since the morning after the Christmas party: We're friends, best friends, she's happily engaged, it's time to move on. He busies himself with picking up the rest of the file folders and returning them to their box, allowing himself a little bit more time to get his thoughts together before he looks at her again.
There's still some color on her cheeks when he meets her eye, but he doesn't look away this time. Instead he takes her in, notices that her hair is pulled into a pony tail instead of half up and that it exposes a lot more of her neck than he'd ever seen before, sees that she has on jeans instead of a skirt and nylons and a sweatshirt instead of a button down. It's rare that he sees her like this and it puts images of a future he'll never have in his head: seeing her dressed like this on the weekends as they run errands or do work around the house, watching her throw her hair into a ponytail as she gets ready to paint, kicking off a pair of of tennis shoes next to a pair of small white Keds. He realizes then that she's not looking away either, she's looking at him looking at her, and he feels all the hard work he's done putting his feeling aside start to crumble.
His phone rings in his pocket and jerks him out of it. She jumps at the sound, too, and quickly turns away, disappearing around the corner of the shelf. Jim clears his throat and answers his phone, kind of glad that the moment is over because he feels pretty sure that he was about to open his mouth and make a fool of himself. He exhales as he lifts the phone to his ear and repeats his mantra again: we're friends, best friends, she's happily engaged, it's time to move on.
It's Katy on the other end, letting him know that she's getting ready to hit the road. For a split second, he wonders why she's calling him at 9:20 in the morning, then remembers that he asked her to. Guilt rears it's ugly head once more, so he speaks to her for a little longer than he would have normally. She says that she'll miss him and he says that he'll miss her, too, and he tries really hard to believe the words as they leave his mouth.
He hangs up after several minutes and gets back to counting boxes. He's on number 48 when he becomes aware of someone staring at him. He sighs, resigns himself to counting the same (hopefully) 117 boxes for the rest of his life, and turns to face Kelly. As soon as they make eye contact, she's off.
"Who was that you were talking to?"
He feels his eyebrows raise into his hairline, then knit together. "Um, why?"
"Because it sounded a lot like a girlfriend. Who's your girlfriend? I didn't know you had a girlfriend."
He feels someone else staring at him, too, someone on the other side of the shelf. He clears his throat and very decidedly doesn't look at Pam. "I don't, I guess? I don't know. It was Katy."
Kelly's mouth drops open into a perfect, round "O." She crosses over to Jim, her own inventory duties totally forgotten. "Katy? Purse girl Katy? Oh my gosh! I didn't know you were still dating her!"
"Uh, yeah, it's a casual thing, I guess. We, um, we stopped hanging out for a bit but..."
"But you got back together? You guys are such soulmates. I can totally tell about soulmates. I was so sad when Pam told me that you guys broke up--"
Wait, what?
"--because I was thinking that out of everyone in the office you guys would make the cutest babies even though she doesn't technically work here, and then Pam said that you said that she wasn't your type and that you guys weren't that serious and Jim, I was so said--"
He chances a glance across the tops of the file folder boxes and doesn't see Pam there, so he takes a risk. "Kelly, wait, Pam told you all of that?"
"Yeah, that's what she said! And then Ryan told me that you told him at your party that you and Katy hadn't talked in a while and I was just so sad for you, Jim. I'm so happy you're back together!" She flings her arms out and squeezes Jim in a hug that's surprisingly hard before she turns away and happily goes back to counting boxes of message books.
Jim's mind is reeling. He doesn't know what to make of the fact that Pam was discussing his love life. Or had been discussing his love life. That she seemingly had more than a passing interest in his love life. And then the disappearing act she'd pulled when Kelly started talking about the things Pam had told her, or maybe she got away from the conversation when she overheard that Jim had been talking to Katy? He needs to get out of the warehouse and out into the fresh air and think about the implications of what he's just found out, or even if there are any implications at all. He can't help but think that there must be some, that it has to mean something.
He marks on his sheet that yes, there are definitely 117 boxes of single tab manila file folders and tosses his clipboard onto the stack of boxes. He heads for the side door of the warehouse and wonders if any of this means what he hopes it means, that Pam talking about his dating life means that--
And then he sees her, standing a few feet away and winding her arms around Roy's neck. Roy has one hand on the small of her back and it fills Jim with jealousy and heartache and an overwhelming desire to throw up and he turns away just as he sees Roy lean his face towards Pam's. He walks back to his shelf and finds his clipboard, sees that next he's supposed to count how many boxes there are of single tab hanging file folders.
Of course it doesn't mean anything. He feels stupid to even attempt to find hope in what is nothing more than office gossip. That's the way it is in a small office: people talk about their coworkers. To attach any significance to the fact that Pam discussed his love life is absurd.
He starts his mantra again, only a little different this time. We're friends, best friends, she's happily engaged, it's time to move on. It doesn't mean anything.
We're friends. Best friends.
She's happily engaged.
It's time to move on.
It doesn't mean anything.
