Pam couldn’t help the shiver of nervousness that ran down her spine as she and Jim pulled into her parent’s driveway. The holidays were stressful enough. Over the last few months she’d noticed her parents had seemed to be growing apart. She saw some of the same signs in her parents that looking back, had been there with her relationship with Roy. She talked on the phone with her mother regularly, but rarely heard any news of her mother and father doing things together. Likewise, her father had seemed to withdraw from playing an active role family affairs. Jim noticed her look of apprehension at once.

“Hey,” he reached over and rubbed her shoulder. “It’ll be okay.”

“I hope so.” Pam hung her head for a moment before looking back up at Jim. “I really hope this is just kind of a rough spot for them.”

“Me too.”

“Come on, let’s head inside. It looks like Penny and Craig are already here. If your parents get to be too much, we can always disappear with them.”

“I don’t think it’ll come to that. Not with the rest of the Beesly clan showing up too,” Pam said as they got out of the car.

“Right,” Jim agreed as he fished a crock pot filled with queso dip and bags of chips out of the back seat. “Let me see if I’ve got the family tree right. William, your dad is the oldest. Married Helene and had you and Penny. Penny is dating Craig and it’s ‘getting serious.’ Next is your Uncle Dan, married to Holly who have Jill and Robert. Jill is still single. Robert is married to Alison and they have one kid, Rebecca. After that is your Aunt Mary-Jo who is married to Ryan. They have George, married to Grace with three kids, Andrew, Jody, and Sam. Harry who is single and Amber who is engaged to Anthony also with no kids. Last is Aunt Rosie who never got married or had kids. Presiding over everyone is Meemaw Sylvia and Pawpaw Phillip.”

“That’s everyone,” Pam said as she walked with Jim up the driveway carrying some tote bags with White Elephant gifts in them. “I’m impressed that you remembered everybody. We really only have big Beesly get-togethers on the holidays or if someone’s getting married.”

“Occupational hazard m’dear. I learned pretty quick to keep track of names.” Jim didn’t even try to hide the smugness in his voice.

“Uh-huh,” Pam gave him a good-natured hip-check as they approached the door.

It was open so they let themselves in. The sounds of kids running around and other conversations filled the house. After Jim and Pam took off their coats and shoes, they descended into the madness. The crock pot was snatched from Jim’s hands to join the other food set out kitchen counters. Pam was whisked from Jim’s side to help some of the other ladies prepare the meal. Jim found himself being pulled into the den where the Penn State game was on.

After catching up with relatives, Pam escaped the lunacy that was the kitchen. She reached down and grabbed a couple beers from a cooler and headed towards the den to find Jim. He wasn’t there.

That’s odd. She thought to herself. Turning from the entrance to the den she walked across the hall to the large living room. The Christmas tree had a wide array of gifts set under it. Next to the tree Pam saw her Meemaw perched in the wingback armchair that was pointed towards the fireplace. She had a glass of sherry wine in her hand. Jim was kneeling on the hearth, setting logs and kindling on the grate. A box of matches was resting next to him. As Pam approached, she heard the conversation.

“Are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Sylvia pointed to the fireplace

“Absolutely!” Jim grinned as he tore up strips of newspaper to add to the firelay. “I may have stopped going to Boy Scout camp for basketball camp after my sophomore year in high school, but I never forgot how to build a fire.”

“You were in Scouts?” Sylvia sipped her wine. “What rank did you get to?”

“All the way to Eagle Scout,” Jim said with pride.

Sylvia nodded approvingly. “Good for you. What was your Eagle project?”

“His what?” Pam was close enough now to join the conversation.

Jim answered her. “One of the requirements for Eagle Scout is to come with and give leadership to a service project that benefits the community in some way. It’s supposed to be kind of above and beyond the normal kind of thing a Scout might do. I led a big clean-up effort for a youth center that does a lot with under-privileged kids. We cleaned up all the outside areas of the center, repaired the blacktop on the basketball court, painted over a lot of graffiti, that kind of thing.”

“Sounds like a worthy cause indeed,” Sylvia remarked.

Jim and Pam stayed talking with Sylvia. After Jim had the fireplace set to his satisfaction, he got the fire going with one match and not a drop of lighter fluid. Penny and Craig eventually found them and joined in the easy conversation they had going. Dinner was a causal affair with people grabbing what they wanted from the potluck and finding any convenient space to eat. Jim would later remark the Beesly family White Elephant was a lot more fun than Dunder-Mifflin Yankee Swap, even though the rules were essentially the same. Pam told him it was due to the fact they knew what the rules were going into the game. Jim walked away from the game with a puzzle that claimed to be the world's most difficult jigsaw puzzle. The picture on the box was of a collage of Dalmatians. Pam looked over and read on the box the puzzle pieces were double sided with the same picture on both sides. However, the image was rotated ninety degrees from one side to the other.

“How long is that going to take you?” she pointed at Jim’s gift

“Oh, who knows,” he said. “How long is that going to take you to polish off?”

Pam held up her bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream proudly. It had been a hotly contested item. “Guess we’ll find out together.”

The party stated to break up after the gift exchange. Pam and Jim along with Penny and Craig agreed to stay to help clean up after the rest of the relatives left. Pam was bringing some folding chairs back to hallway closet when she heard tense voices from her parent’s room. Helene was bickering at William for some perceived injustice from Sylvia. William was steadfastly denying her concerns, which wasn’t helping placate Helene. Slowly Pam backed away from the door.

Her quiet mood persisted during the ride back to Jim’s apartment. Claiming a headache, she changed into the pink robe she kept in Jim’s closet and retreated into his bathroom to draw a bath. She poured in a generous amount of lavender scented bubble bath, doffed her robe, and stepped into the tub. The warm water usually helped to ease her stress, but she was finding it hard to stop remembering her parent’s argument. A knock on the door broke her reverie.

“Come in.”

“Hey,” Jim said softly as he sat down on the closed toilet lid.

“Hey,” she replied.

“Want to talk about it?”

Pam let out a sigh. “It’s nothing you haven’t heard before. I think I just need something to take my mind off it is all.”

“Your wish is my command.” Jim reached behind him and pulled out a white envelope and a hand towel.

On the Tenth day of Christmas my office gave to me

The corners of Pam’s mouth started to sneak upwards as she dried off her hands to open the envelope. What she saw caused a bubble of laughter to echo through the bathroom. She instantly recognized the façade of their office building. Set along the edge of the roof were a line of ten Michaels. She instantly placed the scene in question from when Michael had tried to lecture about the dangers of depression. The back of the card confirmed what she had thought up when she saw the image

Ten Michaels leaping
Nine Kellys dancing
Eight Moses milking
Seven swans a-melting
Six geese a-flopping
Five teal teapots
Four calling phones
Three pointless meetings
Two Olympic doves
And a Dundie in a paper tree

“He is kind of the lord of the office, isn’t he?” The twinkle was back in Pam’s eye.

“Just don’t let him catch you saying that,” Jim warned.

“Duly noted.” Pam handed Jim back the card for him to put on the counter so it wouldn’t get wet. “Now are you going to just sit there or are you going to join me in this nice warm water?”