He thinks about her ever day.

Not just once, either. It’s not like he checks a little mental box labeled “think about Pam” and then gets to go on with his day (note: he would get to check that box basically as soon as he woke up every morning, so it would be a real convenience if things did work this way, but they don’t). No, he thinks about her pretty much constantly. Every time a phone rings and the wrong person answers (well, technically the right person, since these people are calling Dunder Mifflin Stamford, not Dunder Mifflin Scranton, and so having Pam pick up would be weird and inappropriate, but for him it’s the wrong person. He briefly thinks that if he were dictator of the world all phones would be answered “Dunder Mifflin. This is Pam.” But then he thinks that if he were really dictator of the world, he could probably fix some bigger problems. And besides, hearing that every day out of the wrong mouths would actually probably make things worse, not better). Every time he comes home to an empty boring apartment with no Mark to hang out with and no food in the cupboards and no reason to be there except that he couldn’t stand to be in Scranton one more minute. Every time…well, just every time.

And of course he thinks of her double-triple-quadruple-infinity on June 10, when he’s not in Australia and not in Scranton and not at her wedding objecting to her marrying Roy. Even though he wishes to hell he were either the first or the last so he wouldn’t be thinking about it quite as much.

But that’s not really noticing her. It’s just like breathing for him, and it’s all in his head, all memories and baggage he’s carrying around with him. It’s all on him.

The next time he actually notices her is when they get the new Dunder Mifflin directories in early July. He takes a deep breath and he opens the binder (surprisingly heavy, but then, they would spring for the fancy paper to show off Dunder Mifflin wares, wouldn’t they?) and he looks at the As.

There’s Roy Anderson (along with a John, David, and Lyle Andersons as well, in Utica, Albany, and New York Corporate respectively, and an Angela Anderson, also at Corporate, who he feels very sorry for, name-wise).

He’s not quite sure what to do with this—did she leave the company? Oh God, is Pam pregnant and on maternity leave?—so before he can stop himself he’s flipped to the Bs, and there she is. Pamela Beesley. Well, OK, so they misspelled her name, but it’s definitely her, (Scranton: Receptionist) and there’s a little thumbnail picture as well in case he had any doubt.

His first thought is that the book is outdated (after all, for printing in July, when did they have to put in the data?) or that she finally won an argument with Roy and got to (decided to) keep her name after marriage, cringing at all the Pamela Anderson jokes coming from Michael et al. if she did change it. Then he thinks about Roy and thinks about Michael and realizes that that is not the most likely explanation (though he still can’t put aside printing lag as the reason).

The problem consumes him and he briefly considers stalking her online—something he’s decisively decided is not a good idea because of his own tenuous grasp on sanity as a result of this whole…situation—before opting instead to try and ignore the question by throwing himself whole-heartedly into today’s work. He’ll fill out purchase orders, cold-call new clients, cold-call old clients, empty his wastebasket, clean out the men’s room toilet—anything to feel vaguely productive and distract himself from the nagging question of why Pam Beesly is still Pam Beesly.

It’s when he’s made his way down to the next-to-last task on his task list, sorting through spam mail (cleaning out toilets didn’t actually make it on—the last one is “organize paper supply closet by color”) that he stumbles on a treasure trove of emails that make him close his email client, stand up, walk to the men’s room, and hurl before he even has a chance to read them.

There they are, marked as SPAM by Outlook because too many of them came in too short a time with too similar of keywords, all from too similar a set of email addresses: a horde of bold unread email subjects from his former Scranton colleagues, starting with Michael and Kelly but also (to his surprise) including Kevin, Oscar, Toby, Dwight (!), and Angela (!!).

Pam’s Wedding is Off

Pam’s Wedding CANCELLED

She Called it OFF

ALERT: PAMELALALALA IS FREE

And so on.

When he’s cleaned up the men’s room sink, he sits back down, opens Outlook again, and scrolls through the list.

None of the emails is from Pam.

He wishes he were more surprised.

He also wishes he were sure the bad taste in his mouth and the twinge in his gut were just from having puked.