He’s glad she has Ryan and Kelly writing those invitations, because he’d been petrified that she would ask him as soon as he noticed that box of fancy notepaper sitting on her desk. It would be just his luck, he’d thought, that she’d waltz up to his desk with that little skip that he just can’t possibly ever say no to and tell him something adorable and heartwrenching at the same time: something like “I just know you’ll know who to invite” or “ I couldn’t possibly imagine writing these without you” or even “I can’t do this alone” and he’d find himself caught between the Scylla of telling her no and the Charybdis of having to not just watch her plan her marriage to another man but actively participate. Not that he’s not already in a whirlpool (or is it dashed against a rock?) having to hear her talk to Ryan and Kelly about it.
Not least because the whole Ryan-Kelly situation is reminding him of a loud, abrasive, obnoxious version of his own life, only with Ryan playing the Pam role much more…grumpily, aggressively, and angrily.
He also hopes he’s playing the Kelly role a little more subtly. Or at least less…hopelessly? No, because, he realizes, she has a lot more hope than he ever will. He loves Pam Beesly, loves her with parts of him that he didn’t realize he had, like how the Bowmaster Flex promised to tone muscles Mark didn’t even know about. But just like that extremely optimistic purchase, he’s sitting in the closet gathering dust. She’s engaged to someone else. Ryan’s just a dick. So while he can’t really understand why Kelly is putting herself through this (don’t look at that one too hard, he advises himself, it has teeth), he has to acknowledge that all she has to do is to get Ryan to like her. He has to get Pam to like him—and then to not marry Roy.
One of these is harder than the other, he reflects, as she notices him staring at her (oops) and sticks her tongue out at him before using that same delightful little tongue (and stop thinking about her tongue that way Halpert, she’s not yours) to lick an envelope when Kelly catches her with it out. He’s pretty sure Pam likes him a lot more than Ryan likes Kelly. But the effort involved in getting her not to marry Roy? That’s a totally different question.
After a little while he can’t take it anymore, and he realizes in a flash of inspiration that with Ryan and Kelly out here the annex must be fairly open—and marginally more devoid of gossips, although he does have to remind himself that Angela’s still back there. He heaves himself to his feet, struggling to ignore how Pam’s eyes flit directly to him with the motion, and walks to the back.
“Hey, Toby, can you spare a minute?”
One fifteen-minute bitch session (and let’s be honest, it really is just a bitch session—he’s not really complaining, he just needs to get the words out before they burst from his chest like the creature in Alien) and a promise on Toby’s end to keep this confidential (“I have to write it up, but I promise, your name won’t go on it and I’ll put it at the bottom of the pile. And you know, with Dwight’s constant influx of complaints about you, I somehow doubt I’ll ever get to the bottom of that pile…”) later, he’s back in the main office feeling a lot better.
Until, that is, he hears Ryan’s little outburst to Pam when she tells him to be nice to Kelly.
“I know what I said.”
It’s classic Ryan, in that it’s pointlessly hurtful and yet doesn’t actually accomplish anything, since Kelly’s not there to register it. But it also puts him into a little spiral of his own, just when he thought he was out of it. Sure, Ryan’s the dick version of Pam in his little analogy, but…what if this is how Pam feels too? What if she knows what she’s doing to him—is just stringing him along as an emotional aid when Roy’s too much of an ass to bear? He doesn’t think Pam’s really like that, but the possibility keeps nagging at the edge of his mind. What if? What if she’s not even conscious of quite how far he’s gone, but still aware that he has some kind of feelings, and she’s manipulating that for her own benefit? He doesn’t think she’d do it if she knew quite how hard he’s fallen, but…if she thinks it’s just a crush, like he stupidly told her? He could totally see her playing to it, not as maliciously as Ryan, sure, but still for her own benefit.
In this light, her not asking him to do the cards looks less like kindness or luck and more like a calculated choice: this would make him break, this I can’t do, but I’ll keep leaning on him in other ways. Again, he doesn’t even fully believe she could be that cruel intentionally, but he can’t take that chance.
He clicks back to the travel website he’d been browsing idly before and starts clicking around with renewed purpose. He has to get out of here—he already knew he couldn’t watch Roy get what he’s always wanted, but now he has an additional urgency in letting her know he won’t be there. He needs her to know that this best friend thing? It doesn’t extend (quite) to the point of a suicide pact. He’ll be with her every step of the way that he can bear, but he’s not going to let her string him along into…whatever he’d feel he had to do if he got to June 10.
In some strange way, he realizes, this is still him trying to protect her. Because one thing he knows for sure is that if he’s in that little church on June 10, he’s going to object. No, he knows that’s not actually a real part of most weddings anymore: no one asks you to speak now or forever hold your peace. They just get on with the marrying. But asked or not, pregnant pause for it or not, he’s going to object. They’ll have to carry him screaming out of that church if they want him to let her get married to Roy. And he can’t actually do that to her. He’ll just remove himself from the equation, for both their sakes.
The travel site is having a special on long distance trips, trips that take over 20 hours. He notices the first one listed: Sydney, Australia, 23 hours 25 minutes. Halfway around the world seems far enough. He doesn’t even know what time her wedding will be, Australia time, and he’s suddenly more than OK with that. Before he knows what’s what, he’s clicked on it and booked it and sent the email to Michael and Toby requesting time off (which he’s pretty sure they’ll grant—if nothing else, Michael will look at the dates, see it includes June 10, and insist on having a Hooters lunch to help Jim “get over bitches,” but he’ll definitely give him the time off, and given the talk he just had with Toby, he’s pretty clear on that score too).
He sits back in his chair and finally lets himself stare at Pam. She’s giggling with Kelly about something, probably wedding-related, and he lets out a big sigh. No, she’s not the terrible person Ryan is. Not even close. But she’s still too dangerous for him to be around when June 10 rolls around. Just as he’s thinking that, she looks over at him, still giggling, and her smile widens.
God, he needs to get out of here.
