Pam was startled to hear the line go dead, and looked up to see a very annoyed Roy leaning over her desk, his finger still depressing the receiver to hang up the phone.

“Who the fuck was that?” he growled, and she stifled a sigh. When Roy got like this—“tipsy,” her mom had called it, “standing drunk” her dad had answered, and “just relaxed” Roy always insisted, which was to say, in her own terms, just drunk enough to be incapable of a mature conversation and just sober enough that a bar wouldn’t confiscate his keys—she had to be very careful of what she said and did. Not that he’d hurt her! He hadn’t ever hurt her, and she didn’t really think he would. But she’d started having to have those little internal debates where she had to assure herself that, no, he really wouldn’t, and she wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Not that she was going to let him see that.

Oh god, what had he seen? Not that there was anything for him to see, of course. She was just on the phone with a coworker—or a future coworker at any rate—and she’d…well, she’d been laughing, which she hadn’t done that much of recently, but she hadn’t actually said anything wrong, had she? Silly thought, that. What would she say that was wrong? It was just an innocent conversation about zombies and Michael and a sister who went to Scranton (she wondered if Jim’s sister was in any of the same classes as her own sister, Penny). It was innocent. It was fun. It had been too long since she’d had innocent fun, honestly. Painting in the basement while Roy was out with his friends didn’t count.

So there was nothing to feel guilty about, nothing at all. Nothing even to reflect on to not feel guilty about, so why was she thinking about feeling guilty? No reason, she decided. She was just flustered by the unexpected appearance of her fiancé, that was all. The happiness and excitement you were supposed to feel when your one true love came by would be along in a minute. After all, Roy was her one true love, wasn’t he? She’d been in love with him since elementary school: the big, strong, popular kid that everyone could see was going to grow up to be the star football player and then did. It had been a dream come true (she’d actually pinched herself) when he’d lumbered up to her table in the cafeteria in tenth grade and asked her to homecoming; she’d pinched herself again when he’d promised they’d stay together after graduation; she’d been giddy when he’d proposed a year ago, after five years of dating. All her friends were jealous, not because they didn’t think she deserved him (when she’d voiced this concern Izzy had smacked her arm and said if anything he didn’t deserve her, which was nonsense of course but it was nice to have friends who believed in you) but because she and Roy had found each other so early, had stuck it out through thick and thin, and were just so lucky. It was one of those stories you told the grandchildren, a fairytale romance.

Unwanted, the memory of actually reading Grimm’s Fairy Tales in English class flashed through her mind.

But she hadn’t cut off a toe to marry Roy…not that they were married. Yet. They’d had some difficulty picking a wedding date, true, and she still didn’t have a proper engagement ring (he’d proposed at the dinner table on Thanksgiving, breaking the wishbone with her and asking her to be his wife as his wish. She hated public proposals, even in front of family, but she still had the wishbone, preserved and wrapped in a handkerchief in her sock drawer). But they were going to get married. It was what she most wanted in the world.

None of these were particularly new thoughts, though they didn’t usually come in such a horde all together, and they ran through Pam’s mind rapidly in the instant after she noticed Roy’s presence, along with a brief shock that she’d somehow failed to notice him come in. She must have been more wrapped up in her phone call—her innocent, no-guilt phone call—than she’d realized. She knew she had to respond to Roy quickly, because he got testy when he thought she was ignoring him, and missing his entrance into Dunder Mifflin was a bad start.

“Just a new employee who needed some orientation help.” It was probably a good thing her brain, or at least her mouth, was still in Michael-managing mode after that conversation. She didn’t like to think what it meant that the two men in her life, her boss and her fiancé, both needed “managing,” but at least she was good at it. “I was trying to convince him that Michael isn’t that bad.” Well, no, she hadn’t. She’d assured him that Michael was harmless, true, but only after she’d made it much more clear than she usually let herself do that he was not the easiest boss to work for. But turning from her own perceived misdeeds to Michael’s was usually a good way to get Roy off the scent. Again, she deliberately avoided taking that thought any further than it had already gone.

Fortunately, the technique was one she used often for a reason: it worked. “Fuckin’ Scott.” Roy leaned back and released the phone receiver, which clicked back loudly in the empty office. He narrowed his eyes. “Why was he calling so late?”

“He said something about having a meeting at the university.” She shrugged. “Not my problem, but I was still here, so I had to answer the phone.”

“Why were you still here?” Roy looked puzzled and still somewhat disgruntled. “Thought you were coming with us to Poor Richard’s.”

Before she could come up with a response to that that wasn’t snappish—exactly how had he thought she was getting to Poor Richard’s when he took the truck and left her?—he went on. “Darryl noticed you weren’t there and gave me shit ‘til I went back to you.” He reached for her hand. “Show him.”

She stood up without his help. “Are you really OK to drive?” She regretted the words as soon as they were out of her mouth.

“’Course I am.” He didn’t sway as they walked out of the office together, but she could smell the alcohol on his breath. “I got here, didn’t I?”

The rest of that night was a pretty typical night, in Pam’s experience. She and Roy got themselves to Poor Richard’s, Roy made a production of bringing her to the booth where the other warehouse guys were sitting (“See, Darryl, I can take care of my woman”) and then wandered off to play darts, and she slowly sipped a single beer while watching the guys (and Madge) finish off pitchers. She drove Roy home, tucked him into bed, and watched old movies on one of the local access stations until she felt tired herself and trudged upstairs to join him.  She set out the next day’s clothes on her dresser, remembering that Roy always had a rough head the night after a Poor Richard’s outing and would probably be running late, and at the last minute decided to switch out her brown cardigan for a pink, somewhat less sacklike article. After all, she had a new coworker coming in tomorrow. It was important to make a good first impression.