Pam’s life refuses to acknowledge how much it has been turned on its axis, and insists on plodding along as if it’s normal. She’s not so much frustrated by this as baffled: how is it that she can break up with her fiancé, the boyfriend she’d been planning her life around for a decade, move out of the house she’s lived in with him for years, and have everything seem totally OK? There should be thunder and lightning and panic, but instead it’s just…nice? She likes her new life. She carpools with Jim, because she’s still not sure how much her salary covers and how much Roy’s covered, and Jim is nice about it and cracks jokes about how she should be glad she taught him how to drive stick. How did she never know he had a stickshift car? Doubts begin to circle about just how bad he could have been at driving stick if he owns a stickshift, but she doesn’t exactly remember if he had this same car when she was teaching him—it’s an older car, but he could have gotten it used, probably did given that Jim doesn’t spend money on anything as far as she can tell—so she doesn’t say anything except to thrust her nose in the air and pretend to be extremely smug about his driving. She’s booked into the hotel for two weeks (extended stay indeed) but two weeks is really not that much time so she’s researching places (Jim’s list is invaluable) when it hits her that she can’t arrange to visit any of them after work because Jim is driving her in.

When she tries to raise this objection he merely waggles his eyebrows at her and suggests that he can drive her to her showings, and while she tries to put up a defense (doesn’t he have better things to do with his evenings—like date his hot new girlfriend?—not that she says that second part, because she’s not that nosy even if she secretly is) she lets him win with a degree of ease that makes her feel a little guilty inside. Because she’s realizing right now that Jim is her rock; Jim is why there isn’t thunder or lightning or even any panic, because every time she has a problem he coaxes it out of her and together they find a solution. The extended stay place doesn’t have an oven, but they’ll let you use your own electronics and Jim’s mom just happens to be getting rid of the old toaster oven they’d had since he was a kid, and “I couldn’t bear to send Old Toastie to a farm upstate, do you think you could take him, Pam?” She absolutely hates going to the bank, and Roy is too lazy, so when they split their joint accounts somehow it’s Jim who talks her through the online process to set up her new account and then waits outside in the car cheerleading while she dashes in for the part that absolutely has to be done in person.

She jokes to her sister that she thinks she loves Jim and receives a raised eyebrow that both reminds her of him and sends her scuttling away into her pillow cushions in embarrassment, reiterating over and over to herself that he has a girlfriend. And anyway, she shouldn’t be getting into anything right now, not just after breaking up with Roy, she assures herself and a skeptical Penny. She doesn’t say but her sister somehow seems to intuit that this principled stand might not be as easy to uphold if Jim weren’t dating “Pam 6.0.” But he is, and there’s no reason to think he’ll stop anytime soon, so she just basks guiltily in all the attention he’s spending on her and not Katy. If it doesn’t bother him, she’s sure as hell not going to let it bother her.

She finds the perfect apartment (well, perfect for her price range and distance from work anyway) and it just feels right that Jim is the one standing beside her and checking the tops of the cabinets and refrigerator for dust and mold while she chatters on about natural light and a spare closet for her art supplies (though now that she thinks about it, it was Jim who pointed out that she could use the extra storage space for paints and canvas). She signs a lease solo for the first time in her life, and it only seems right that they go out for drinks afterwards at this little bar that Jim knows, and she just stares at him two drinks in while he talks about…nothing and everything…and she wishes this were really her life.

Wishes he were really hers.

And that’s the real change that she thinks should have been introduced, not with thunder and lightning, but with trumpets and coronets. She wishes again, not dull compensatory wishes like “I wish Roy would do the dishes for once” or “I wish we had set a date for the wedding,” but big bold ones like “I wish I were an artist” and “I wish Jim were mine.” The kind of wishes that ask you to take a strong step off a steep cliff and trust that your wings have fledged enough to fly.

She’s taking a step off one of those cliffs—applying for an art class at the community college over the summer—when the phone rings and the person on the other end asks to be connected to Jim Halpert.

“Of course. May I ask who’s calling?”

“Oh! Yes, it’s Katy. Katy Moore.”

And just like that she can feel the rocks at the bottom of the cliff rising up to meet her. She doesn’t X out of the window with the application yet, but she does get a little punchy as she transfers Jim, and tries not to glare in unearned jealousy when he grins as soon as he figures out who’s on the phone. She finds herself typing really loudly as she fills in the rest of the application—she may not have Jim, but she can learn about Watercolors all by herself, thank you—and when he sets down the phone with a smile on his face she all but snaps at him.

“You can give her your direct extension, you know.”

His eyebrows fly up and she’s surprised as he moves quickly towards her desk. Jim only moves quickly when he cares about something, she knows—he usually glides, she’s admired his movements even before she was single—and so she starts to worry she’s upset him with her little jealous spat, and tries to apologize.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I…”

For once Jim interrupts her.

“Hey, what’s going on?” His voice is surprisingly soft.

“I just…” she can’t not answer his question, but she’s not going to answer the real question, she’s too embarrassed, so she takes refuge in rephrasing what she’d already said. “Katy. You can give her your direct line. If she’s going to be calling you here. A lot.”

“Why would I need to do that?” He looks at her quizzically. “Steve only has one birthday a year.”

“Huh? Steve?” Her brain is blank, trying to process what he’s saying and why it’s relevant that Steve has one birthday.

He takes in her glazed look and settles down on his elbows across her desk. “That was Steve’s girlfriend, Katy. You might remember her from the day she came to sell purses?” She must have made some kind of sign because he nods, as if satisfied. “Steve’s birthday is Tuesday, and she wanted to know if I could come hang out. Apparently Steve has been saying things about how I’m ‘too busy for my old friends’ and ‘he doesn’t even recognize my face anymore.’” He makes air quotes around the words. “Which is bullshit because I wiped the floor with him at the Y on Saturday, but maybe he’s too embarrassed to tell her that.” He grins and she smiles back reflexively because all interaction with the outside world is suspended right now, thank you very much, please come back later after we’ve finished processing the casual delivery of the news that Jim and Katy are not dating. That Jim is, to her knowledge, single. That he’s been spending all his time with her. OK, to be fair, she kind of knew that last one, but the mention of Steve’s complaining drives it home.

Oh.

Oh.

Jim ducks his head a little and she’s intrigued, because he looks suddenly, achingly shy, and she’s not sure what’s going on, but then he continues and her confusion drifts away like clouds in the sun. “So, uh, Katy’s organizing a birthday party for him at Poor Richard’s, and apparently I’m supposed to, and I quote,” here again he deployed the finger quotes, “‘bring along whomever it is I’ve been spending my time with instead of my old friends.’ Which, honestly, I’ve known you longer than I’ve known Steve.” He huffs in what she suspects is mock-exasperation and then meets her eyes hesitantly. “So, uh, will you come?”

Apparently interaction with the outside world has been restored, because she’s smiling, and he’s grinning back, and she realizes she really really needs to answer his question.

“Yes.”

If she thought he was grinning before, now he’s the Cheshire Cat, all grin and nothing else.

“Then it’s a date.”