Pam looked at her reflection on the screen. 

Just plain old Pam, in her usual attire- Well, she reflected, studying the cardigan she was wearing. This was standard work attire, but the last days she had mostly left all that in her closet in favour of yoga pants and sweatshirts. 

One of the few perks of being in a lockdown, she guessed.

She checked if the waiting room was disabled.

Still nothing.

9.12 and the man with whom she was supposed to have a zoom meeting was running late. Or was just plain late. Is it ok to say “running” if you’re not supposed to be moving? Pam didn’t know.

She stared at her reflection again and sniffed her clothes. They didn’t look as if they’d spent a lot of time in her closet… then again maybe it hadn’t been enough for that funny smell clothes get after a season of storage.

The Pam on the screen looked bored. Was that her usual face every day behind reception? Was her hair really that plain-

The tell-tale ding dong snapped her out of her reverie.

She got a glimpse of a big nose- a blur- a thump and then it all went blank. Pam could swear she heard a muffled “fuck” right before the face of the man she was supposed to meet was taking most of her screen again, this time for good.

He looked young-ish, wearing a plain white shirt and a tie, even though it was not necessary to do so. Well, it hadn’t been necessary for Pam to wear her usual skirt either, but there they were. His hair, though, looked as if his natural habitat were t-shirts and sweatpants, and it was slightly at odds with the office attire. She was willing to bet he was wearing pyjamas under the table.

“I am so sorry about that,” he said. Pam couldn’t resist looking at him with an eyebrow arched for a second, before her professional self kicked in.

“Hello uh…” she checked her notes, “Mr. Halpert.”

“Jim, just Jim, please,” he smiled sheepishly for a second. “I’m sorry I’m late, Pam. Power went out and I had to borrow my roommate's phone who didn’t have Zoom installed and- well, sorry, you don’t want to hear it.”

Pam decided to smile a little. People seemed to feel entitled to excuses these days, and there was really no way to tell if he was being honest or using the general lockdown chaos for just being late.

“Yeah well, I’m glad you finally made it.”

Jim’s smile grew a little. “Me too. I was scared you'd fired me before I started bacuase of this," he chuckled. "Also, I hated the idea of keeping you waiting.”

Later she tried to decide if it was because of the friendly demeanour, or just because it was nice to believe he was being honest, but before she thought about it she was smiling too.

“It is not up to me to fire you," she said, in a mock impression of serious consideretion. He grimaced. She smiled again. "It wasn’t that long,” she finally said. “And I promise this meeting won’t be either.”

“Oh,” he said. “I was hoping to get a feeling of the job.”

“Well…” Pam sighed, and checked that the conversation wasn’t being recorded at his side, “there’s not much to tell you about it. Just… maybe you should be grateful that you will start working from home and not from the office.”

“Really, and why’s that?”

“We might have the ugliest bullpen in Pennsylvania.”

Jim laughed. “I was there for my interview with Michael, right before the lockdown.”

“Riiight, I’d forgotten.” Of course he had. He and half a dozen poor souls actually wanting to get hired ad Dunder Mifflin. Which just showed that people were in need of money, and not very much of it. Pam couldn't think of any other reason why anybody would apply for that job.

“The question is, why didn’t I meet you then?” Jim was saying, with a slightly puzzled expression.

“Your interview was during the week when I had to take a couple of days off. I had a cold.”

Pam remembered exactly the day because she was sorry she hadn’t been there to warn this newcomer about Michael, or Dwight, as she usually did when people were interviewed for new jobs. She also remembered the message she’d gotten that day from Kelly. New guy is REALLY tall.

She had to pay attention to the present, because suddenly Jim was looking concerned. “Are you all right now?”

Pam nodded. “Yeah, it was just a two-days' thing, but I had to get tested anyway. You know… the virus.”

Jim nodded. “Yeah, I know.”

He looked solemn out of a sudden, and even though there hadn’t been any reported cases in Scranton, Pam wondered if he knew somebody who’d gotten ill recently. 

“Anyway,” Jim said, smiling again. 

“Anyway,” Pam repeated. “I am going to forward to your new email address a list of our clients. We know sales are slow these days, but Michael trusts you’ll be able to get some stuff moving…”

She explained. He nodded at the appropriate times, interrupting now and then for a question. It wasn’t terribly difficult to understand, Pam was aware, and this new guy seemed smart and quick witted. When he finally cracked a silly joke about maybe selling toilet paper instead of their usual multipurpose photocopy reams, she genuinely laughed and, for the first time during lockdown Pam found herself wishing she could go back to the office and get to talk to this guy in person.

“I have one last question,” he said, after Pam finished explaining the weekly meetings with other sales persons and their boss.

“Yes?” 

“Do I ever meet with you?”

For a fraction of a second, her heart did a funny jump, but she looked at the plain image of herself in the left corner of her screen and quickly decided she must have imagined something flirty where there was nothing.

“I’m usually in those meetings… taking notes for Michael.”

“I see,” Jim smiled. “And what if I wanted to ask you something? I mean, not in those meetings...” he trailed off.

She smiled, enjoying the illusion of the moment. “You already have my email. And there is my phone number as well but I must warn you, do not try to contact me outside office hours.”

“Promise,” he said. “I won’t be bothering you unless it’s a life threatening situation.”

She chuckled at his mock seriousness. “See that you do.”

“Babe?!” Roy’s voice boomed from behind and Pam cringed. With a hastily click she silenced the mic and looked at the entering figure. 

“I’m working, Roy. It’ll be over in a couple of minutes.” 

“Sorry, sorry,” he said, walking in front of her and not looking sorry at all. He had not been cleared to work yet, and was treating lockdown as an unexpected vacation.

Pam turned the mic on again and focused on the image on the screen. “Sorry about that.”

Jim was looking fixedly at her. “S’ok,” he said. “For a moment I’d forgotten that you are at your place…”

“Yeah,” Pam said, and she noticed her voice sounded weary. “And that was my fiancé.”