Stockings full of coal

Jim’s last Christmas in the office, Michael walked right by him with the bag of names for Secret Santa.

“Whoa, Michael, hey. When do I get to pick?”

“You know, Jim, I don’t really think you should be picking a name, since your name’s not in here, and if you picked, then we’d have one person who wasn’t buying for anyone, and that’s just no fun,” Michael snapped.

Jim gave an incredulous look across to the reception desk out of habit, and received a blank look from Cindy. Pam had quit months ago.

“And why – exactly – is my name not in there?” Jim pressed, even though Michael seemed done with him and was moving on towards accounting.

“Well, because,” Michael explained in the most condescending voice he could muster. “You’re leaving us in January and I didn’t think it was very fair to expect someone to spend their hard earned money to give a nice present to someone who’s not even going to be here to say thank you after a week or so.”

“I’d… say thank you… when I opened it…”

“Yeah, like that’d make anyone feel better,” Michael muttered as he marched over to hold out the bag to Cindy.

“Whoa, okay, so how come Cindy’s picking? She’s leaving like a week after me.” Jim couldn’t explain why he wasn’t just letting this go. It wasn’t like he actually cared if he got a present from someone in the office; it just felt weird to be excluded from this one ritual right before he was going to be gone for good and was actually feeling sentimental about his time here.

“Because! Jim! Because, Cindy is a temp,” – one of several temps who had been covering reception until they could find someone permanent, which Michael seemed to have given up on – “and a temp, by definition, is here temporarily, and we need to be welcoming to our guests in the short amount of time that they are with us, which means treating them like family. Unlike you, who was offered a place in this family for forever, and is just spitting on that to go be a freaking middle school teacher or something.”

“Michael…” Jim’s voice turned low and comforting. He knew where this was coming from – he just wished he could make Michael understand…

“Don’t. You know what, Jim? I don’t even want to hear it, so don’t bother.” Michael pulled the last name out of the bag for himself, looked at it, gave a sigh filled with disgust, and stormed into his office, closing the door behind him.

On the actual day of the gift exchange, Jim moved to sit with the rest of the employees only to once again be rebuffed by Michael.

“Actually, Jim, since you’re not participating, it’d be a little weird for you to be here, so why don’t you just take a breather and go somewhere else.” Jim raised his hands in surrender and began to move away. “Actually, you know what? How about you just sit at your desk and get some work done – make yourself useful to us while you still can.”

“Michael,” Toby started in a warning tone.

“Just… shut it, Toby. Shut. It.”

“It’s okay,” Jim reassured Toby, and walked over to his desk. He tried to tune out the voices as he played Spider Solitaire and started a mental countdown till the New Year.

Stockings full of goodies

When the party was actually getting into full swing, Pam walked into the office and approached him with a smile.

Michael gave a loud snort of disgust. “You could have mentioned you were bringing a guest.”

Jim looked from Pam to Michael and said, “I thought we could all bring guests.”

“Well, yeah, but it would be nice if you’d given a definite yes or no so we could have known about numbers and stuff, and how many sodas to supply.”

Jim looked at the pile of fifty or so cans of soda and blinked. “Well, Kevin was planning on bringing Stacy and now she can’t make it so… we break even.”

Michael rolled his eyes. “Yeah, whatever. Like that’s how it works.”

He retreated into his office and Pam turned to Jim with wide, partly confused, partly amused eyes. “What’s with him?”

Jim shook his head in annoyance. “Do you remember the mood he was in during the last few weeks leading up to the day you left?”

“Yeah,” she nodded understandingly, and then leaned up to whisper in his ear. “But do you remember how you cheered me up when we got home every night after he was a particular pain in the ass?”

Jim scrunched up his face, pretending to be struggling to recall. “You know… I think I have vague memories of that, but you might have to remind me.”

“Oh, I will. Tonight, it’s your turn, I promise,” Pam replied with a teasing grin.

At that moment, Michael stepped out of his office again, looked directly at them and let out a frustrated huff of a breath before turning right back around and closing the door again – as if he’d expected them to have left in those few seconds.

Pam sighed. “You know what? I’m going to try one better. Hold on.”

“Pam, what…?” He asked as she began walking away from him towards Michael’s office. She looked back over her shoulder and gave a shrug and a dismissive wave, as if to say ‘It doesn’t hurt to try.’

She knocked lightly, opened the door, and walked inside, closing it again behind her.

Two minutes later, she walked out and gave him a little thumbs-up and a grin, followed by Michael who was holding a plastic bag.

Michael walked straight over to him, with an almost bashful little smile, and held up the bag. “So, I was… I was going to wait and give this to you on your last day. But it’s Christmas and all, and Christmas is a time for giving, so… here.” He held out the bag to Jim. “It’s not wrapped, but…”

“That’s okay,” Jim said, hardly believing the change. He looked up at Pam who gave an innocent shrug and smile. He opened the bag to find a box containing a mug with big bold letters: World’s Best Employee.

“Wow.” Jim smiled at Michael. “Thank you… so much. It means a lot. You know, I am going to miss it here. Me leaving… it’s nothing to do with you. It’s just–”

“I know,” Michael cut him off, genuinely beginning to tear up. “You don’t have to – she said. She said it all.”

“Oh! Okay. Cool,” Jim responded, looking at Pam curiously yet again.

Michael gave him an affectionate pat on the shoulder and moved away to talk to Ryan.

Pam walked back over to him with a grin. “So?”

“Okay, what did you say to him?” Jim threw an arm around her waist and looked at her in awe.

“Hey, let me keep some mystery going here,” she grinned, and he poked her side in mock annoyance. “Just… years of experience in calming down Michael. And in this case, you know, he was never really mad to begin with, so… it was easier.”

“You’re magical.”

“Well, obviously.”

He leaned back a bit and looked at her curiously. “So do I still get… special treatment this evening?”

“Well, I don’t know! I mean, I did just do all that work to fix the problem,” upon Jim’s exaggerated pout, she continued, “so maybe like, I get special treatment for a little while, and then you get special treatment for a little while…”

“Nice compromise. I like it. I’m in.”

“Oh!” She looked up and grinned. “Hey, mistletoe.”