Monday at the office passed by quickly, and relatively uneventfully, which Pam was thankful for. Karen was back from visiting her friend, and so Pam didn't attempt to go near Jim, whom she noticed was much more reserved and distant than the day before. It was almost as if he was purposefully avoiding her.

As the clock ticked past five, Pam stood, reached for her coat, and put it on. She wanted to get out of the office as quickly as she could and avoid being stuck in the elevator with Jim and Karen. 

"Any big plans tonight?" Jim asked as he walked behind Pam to reach his own jacket. 

"Oh, uh, I'm gonna watch ‘It's a Wonderful Life' and try to pick a song," she replied as she fluffed her hair out from under her collar.

"No luck finding your favourite song then?" he asked as he slipped his own coat on. 

"Not yet," she shrugged. 

"You'll get there," he smiled as he reached for Karen's jacket. "Have a good evening, Beesly," he said as he turned on his heel and walked over to Karen's desk, leaving Pam feeling a dark pit opening in her stomach 

--

Pam trudged into the office the next morning feeling particularly awful. She'd been listening to Christmas songs for hours last night and had stayed up ridiculously late watching ‘It's a Wonderful Life'. She'd gone to bed with thoughts of wondering how much better everyone else's lives, or just Jim's if she were being completely honest, would be if she weren't around, coupled with ‘All I Want for Christmas' playing on repeat. She alternated between images of Jim singing the song to her on one knee with a rose in his hand and of Jim and Karen drinking wine from silver goblets in some sort of castle laughing maniacally saying ‘Pam who?' 

She sat at her desk looking glum with her chin resting heavily in her open palm, trying to stop Mariah Carey's biggest hit from rattling around her brain. She sighed loudly at nothing as she stared into space, not noticing the office door open. 

"Morning Beesly," Jim said cheerfully as he walked past reception.

"Uh," Pam coughed, sitting up straight. "Sorry. Morning," she said a little bashfully, tucking a loose curl behind her ear. 

"Hey Pam," Karen smiled as she breezed into the office, a beat behind Jim. She grinned at Jim, who was taking off his suit jacket, and walked over to her desk. With her back to reception, Karen didn't see Pam shrink down behind her monitor. 

For the rest of the day, Pam kept to herself and tried to avoid everyone. She let her eyes drift up as Karen stood and made her way over to Jim's desk. She tried not to watch their interaction, but she couldn't stop staring at them. She saw Karen frown and roll her eyes, but couldn't quite make out the quiet but obviously tense words she gritted out at Jim. Pam saw Jim's head tip down and then shake slightly from side to side, which caused Karen to huff and stomp away from his desk, pausing only to take her jacket from the coat rack and then leave the office. Pam immediately trained her eyes on her notebook and fiercely doodled, wondering what was going on. 

"Hey," Jim whispered to the top of Pam's head approximately 37 seconds later. 

"Oh, hey," Pam gasped, having jumped out of her skin at Jim's disturbance. 

"Sorry," he smiled as he leaned on her desk. "So, how did the song choosing go? You pick one yet?" he asked as he fished around for a jellybean. 

"Oh don't remind me," she groaned as ‘All I Want for Christmas is You' filled her head again, and she tried not to blush as she looked up at Jim. 

He reached behind and pulled something out of his back pocket. "This might help," he shrugged as he pushed a tape towards her.

"What's this?" she asked as she picked up the tape and began to examine it, not recognising many of the song titles scribbled on the little cardboard insert. 

"It's just some of my favourites. I thought, I dunno," he shrugged, "maybe you might like one of them." 

"Thanks," she whispered as she looked up at him, her mouth dryer than she thought possible.

-- 

After watching everyone, including Jim, leave the office, Pam finally slipped the tape into her purse and headed home. She felt the tape burning a hole in her bag the entire drive and itched to play it, but she didn't have a cassette player in her Yaris. After parking up, Pam rooted around in her purse for her front door keys, her knuckles brushing the cold plastic of the tape case, sending a shiver up her spine.

When she was finally inside, Pam shrugged off her jacket and toed off her shoes. She immediately went to the small stereo in her kitchen and put the tape in. The sound of Otis Redding wafted around the room as Pam began to pull out the ingredients for the sugar cookies she was about to bake. She beat the butter and sugar together as he sang ‘well, I want to kiss you, baby, while you're standing beneath the mistletoe', and blushed slightly thinking that Jim may have put this song onto the mixtape wishing he could kiss Pam under the mistletoe. She quickly shook the idea out of her head. 

Unfamiliar Irish voices took over from Otis as Pam was sifting flour and she paused to listen to the lyrics. She smiled at the thought of some couple, maybe her and Jim, wandering through the cold night of New York City, the bright lights of Times Square and Broadway shining down on them. The turning of the song's lyrics to an argument jolted Pam out of her daydream and focused her back on listening as she mixed, unsure of what to make of the song. ‘Can't make it all alone, I've built my dreams around you', filled her ears before the song closed out, causing her to let out a silent sob.

Pam tipped out the dough and started forming it into a ball, punching it to try and let out some of her adrenaline. The next unknown voices, this time English ones, floated around her. She stilled her movements, tears falling from her eyes as she heard ‘don't you know we've come too far now, just to go and try to throw it all away'. She stopped the tape and wiped her eyes before her tears ruined her cookies. 

She finished the cookies in silence and left them to cool on the rack on the kitchen counter. Pam couldn't bring herself to put the tape back on as she painted the tips of the pinecones she'd collected before the Christmas market gold. It wasn't until she was laying in bed with a facemask on after having a steaming hot, gingerbread scented bath, that Pam felt she was ready to listen to the tape again. 

She pressed play and listened to the gentle synthesised music begin to play. She drifted into her own thoughts and before long, tears were leaking sideways down her face mask and into her hair as ‘the snow is falling down, gets colder day by day, I miss you', rang around her. Is he trying to torture me? she wondered. Is he trying to tell me he's still in love with me? What about Karen? 

Pam was exhausted. She scrubbed the face mask off, and patted the cool moisturiser onto her skin. She looked  in the mirror at her reflection, taking in her red eyes. What a mess she'd made of the past year. The loss of her best friend. The loneliness she felt. The hurt she'd caused. The pain of watching her soulmate with another woman. It struck her as odd that ‘broken engagement' wasn't on of the list of things that she'd fucked up this year.

The list. This damn bucket list. Why am I doing it? she groaned to herself. Sure, some of it had been fun, but most of it was just reminding her of everything she'd lost when she said ‘I can't'.

She wiped her eyes and climbed into bed, pulling the covers right up to her chin. The last song on the tape began to play as Pam's eyes started to flutter shut. The last thing she heard before she slipped into unconsciousness was ‘it's been a long December and there's reason to believe maybe this year will be better than the last', and decided she'd found her favourite Christmas song.