Jim checked his watch. The talking head he’d never give continued in his mind’s eye. He imagined what it looked like from behind the camera, watching his patented mock grimace and darting, sideways glance.
Only every other minute now.
It was 5:20 pm. Everyone who didn’t leave at 5 didn’t answer the phone.
I did this fantasy football thing with Kevin just so I could hear her voice in the background.
In his head he cut the tape, edited that line out. Too naked. (that’s what she said.)
If he called now he could hear her starring as Sam, the Scranton autoattendant, which never failed to make him feel something.
Shouldn’t it be Saa? Yes. Technically it should.
In his real talking heads he kept it light. Tried to pretend he was fooling someone. Luckily the new branch was pretty entertaining, in a boring sort of way. Andy was like Dwight and Michael’s semi-retarded love child. Karen was slick and pretty and a little too interested. Josh was… weird. Too normal, almost. It was like nothing could penetrate his armor (hey, that’s what). Even when he was apparently drunk, his eyes still had that glassy male-model look. Jim wondered if he was gay. There was nothing he could put his finger on (she said), but he thought so.
He picked up and dialed the number like he wasn’t on camera. It would ring five times, just long enough for his blood to stop racing. Then he could go home. When it was picked up after three, “Dunder Mifflin” – without the “this is Pam” – he almost hung up. He couldn’t do this, couldn’t have this conversation with her like nothing had happened. He couldn’t be that guy anymore, the one standing idly by, slowly dying inside.
But then she said, “Oh my God” and he couldn’t put it down either.
He tortures himself by picturing her talking heads.
Yeah, I miss my friend.
He’d seen the ones from last season; her passivity and hypocrisy enraged him. How could she say she was so excited about that mockery of a wedding? How could she act like nothing ever happened between them, and still expect him to come running back to her side like the pathetic puppy he was?
But I got a new car, so that’s nice for me.
No one ever comes right out and says it. They never ask her, on or off camera.
Why didn’t you go to him?
For ten years her life had a built-in ending. She and Roy got married. End of story. That’s all she wrote. There was nothing after, and that was oddly comforting. He was a known quantity, albeit not the most exciting or passionate guy in the world. He was no smarter or more interesting than he looked.
Why aren’t you with him right now?
It took four years for her to see what was right under her nose. Jim was a fantasy, a figment, he couldn’t be for real. Sometimes she liked him so much she could hardly stand it, and then she went back to fourth grade in her mind, playing the life picker with the folded colored paper.
Who do I marry? Eenie, meenie, miney, mo. The paper stopped, opened like a garish fake flower, but she couldn’t see what it said.
