It should have been just another Friday afternoon in the office, just another afternoon that Pam hurried through what little paperwork she had to finish up before she could excuse herself for the day. It should have been another Friday evening spent quietly at home, watching TV or painting or talking to her mother on the phone. It should have been another Friday night spent attempting to avoid replaying in her head conversations just like the one playing out in front of her at that very moment:


"So do you want to see it or not." Karen asked. Pam thought that it should be a question, but had noticed that Karen asked a lot of questions that sounded liked they ended with periods, not question marks.


"I don't know," Jim muttered quietly. "Friday night crowds....." Pam could tell he was smiling, but also serious. She also knew that Karen caught the smile, but not the honesty in Jim's words.


"Oh my God, you're like, agoraphobic." Karen laughed.


Jim played along, "Agoraphobic..." Pam knew the look he had on his face, though she could not see it from reception; the look that said that he understood that this was joking, but also not joking. She knew quite a few of his looks, though she missed seeing them these days, since he faced away from her.


"Yeah," Karen was chuckling.


"Really?"


Karen continued, laughingly, "You would rather sit on your couch and watch a Phillies game than go out to a movie with your Awesome Girlfriend." Pam looked up, straining to hear Jim's reply and wishing, simultaneously, not to hear it. It was banter, the very same thing she and Jim used to do every Friday before closing time, exchanging plans for the weekend and trying to find a way to each let the other know that they each wished they could go home, together. And do anything, or nothing, but just be together.


Jim started to stand. "Absolutely correct." Pam understood the truth in that, and she knew that Jim was trying to reveal the truth of it to Karen, and that he was hoping that she would latch onto that truth. But she didn't, of course.


Kevin walked by reception, and Jim said goodbye to him as Karen continued. "So, here's what's going to happen. You're going to suck it up, and we're going to go to dinner, and then we're going to go to a movie..." Pam recognized that tone in her voice, the tone she covered with laughter but let on that she really meant every word; that there was no negotiating the directive. Pam was starting to wonder if maybe that was one of the attributes about loving Karen that was easier for Jim than loving her: Karen's directness, and how easy it was to just follow, to just go along.


The glass door to Dunder-Mifflin opened, and Pam knew just from the way he threw the door open what was going to happen, what he was here for. It happened in mere seconds: Roy opened the door, the air around him fuming, full of rage and purpose. Pam popped out of her seat, automatically going to placate him because old habits take a long time to disengage themselves from the head and heart. Pam met him just about in front of Jim's desk but Roy's vision was full of vitriol and he was not there for Pam, not this time. Jim shoved Karen out of his way and could see Pam approaching but didn't know what she was about to do; didn't know that he would spend many, many hours of the next week trying to understand how and why he didn't see it coming. Just as Roy cocked his fist Pam stepped in front of him, just as he put all of his 260 pounds behind the force of it, Pam stepped in front and took that punch to her left temple.


The doctors said it wasn't just the punch that did it, but the fact that she hit the other side of her head on Jim's desk as she fell.


The doctors said a lot of things that week. And Jim was about to have some of the horrible, irrevocable words that doctors can say written forever on his heart.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


Those who were there had the same wide-eyed gaze, the same fixation on how normal things were right up until that very moment that all witnesses of violence seem to exhibit. There was the recounting of detail that has absolutely no bearing on what really happened, on how the events of those 11 seconds become so significant in the lives of those involved:


Kevin: "I was halfway to my car, I passed Roy in the hallway and said 'have a good weekend, man'. I shoulda seen that he looked mad, but I didn't pay attention...."


Dwight: "I had my pepper spray but the nozzle misfired. One second later I could have stopped the attack." He paused. "I should have used my nunchucks."


Angela: "I was putting away my files when it happened, thank God I was standing at my desk so I could pick up the phone and dial 911. God only knows how long it would have taken anyone else to figure that out."


Michael: "I was in my office, shutting down my computer and closing my blinds for the day. I always close my blinds, it's just become habit. Since Jan."


Creed: "I tackled Roy to the ground. Martial arts training. I held him there until the cops arrived. He was crying." He paused. "When men like Roy cry, they really cry. I got pretty damp."


And a couple of interviews that tell the story of what happened, that give meaning and life to those frantic, desperate moments:


Phyllis: "After Creed got a hold of Roy, I was the only one that went right to her. I didn't care about the blood. I thought maybe she could hear me, maybe she was afraid. So I talked to her until the ambulance arrived."


Karen: "I thought Pam might not make it out of that office alive, until the ambulance came and they started securing her on the gurney, and they told us that she would probably at least survive the trip to the hospital, if we wanted to follow along." She paused, looked down at her hands. "After I knew that, I started watching Jim cave in on himself." She stopped again, caught her breath. "I started watching him go away. From me....." She paused again. "And I think, even from himself."

It's a rather large waiting room, lined with chairs and couches and TVs tucked in corners, littered with magazines- some outdated, some fairly recent. There are other visitors there, but Pam's family, and her coworkers, make up the largest groups.


Jim is standing with one of those groups, but trying to listen in on the conversation of the other. From across the room he can see Pam's mom, whom he has met, and her dad, whom he has not. There are other family members as well: perhaps a brother, a sister-in-law or maybe a sister, and perhaps an aunt. They are talking in the hushed tones of the worried and waiting while they are standing or sitting; they are grasping onto bottles of water or cups of tepid coffee poured from the corner machine, but are not drinking. They are periodically clutching at each other, sniffling; periodically clasping one another's hands. They are glancing often at the double doors right past their group, waiting for one of the doctors to come through with news.


"This is awful." Michael whispers. Jim is pulled back into his gathering by the words, the first that have been uttered in several long minutes. Of course it's Michael speaking, Jim thinks, and of course he's got nothing substantial to say. It bothers him that he thinks that; he's usually much more tolerant. He fidgets with his irritation, and then fidgets with his own annoyance at his irritation.


No one in their group responds. It's a rhetorical statement to which no one can add. Jim is standing next to Karen; he does not turn to look at her when she touches his sleeve from time to time, but he can see her off-white coat out of the corner of his eye. Phyllis is there too; strong, calm, even. She has called Bob Vance on his cell phone and he is on his way. Jim know that she and Bob will serve as anchor to their own little craft of uncertainty and worry.


He watches Angela in the corner, praying, and for once he is grateful for her faith. For once he doesn't feel inclined to dismiss or wonder, and he wishes to have the words to pray that he can see her mouthing at a continuous clip. He sends her a message from across this room: pray from me, too. Jim knows that if he had a single word to pray, it would be "please".


"I had that spray nearly in his face. If it had only fired correctly....I had just tested it on Tuesday, just like I do all of my security devices every week. And it seemed fine." Dwight had said this over and over, and Jim was finally finding himself able to respond.


"How do you test a nozzle on pepper spray without spraying it?"


Dwight didn't answer. He was looking over at Angela, a furrow between his brow. This is how they had been conversing for the last couple of hours; someone would start a thread of words, and someone else would either pick it up or not, but most often not. And when the thread was allowed to hang in the air and die, no one commented.


"Roy must be beside himself." It's Oscar who says this, of course. Oscar: diplomatic, analytical. Jim feels the irritation again and realizes that it's an easy cover for a whole lot of other things he could be feeling, so he goes with it.


Thinking about Roy does nothing to calm his stomach, which seems to have become the harbor for all that is this horrible experience. Although he hasn't eaten since lunch, it feels unbelievably full and roiling. He can almost hear it churning sickly and he fights the urge every few moment to lean over into that puny looking ficus in the corner and empty whatever it is that's in there onto the roots of it.


He looks over again at those perpetually closed double doors before speaking, steals another glance at Pam's mom. "Who the hell could know what goes through his head." He buries his hands deeply into his pockets, though he could tell that Karen was about to reach for one of them. "He should be beside himself. And I hope he's in jail."


No one in that group can counter that statement, though they all look up at Jim after he says it. Karen continues looking up at him long after her coworker's eyes have left his face. She recognizes the worry written on it, she recognizes the restlessness. There are things now that she doesn't recognize too, things that have nothing at all to do with her, or with them. It worries her, and she knows that she will be watching closely from now on.


Finally, finally, there is the sound of a hand hitting those doors, that door swinging open. A doctor comes through, he has lowered his face mask. Pam's family immediately is surrounding him, their eyes not leaving his face, ready to hear his words but also, read every shadow on it, every nuance. Though Jim's group doesn't move, they all turn toward that doctor, whose words hang the balance of so much.


Jim briefly wonders if doctors have any idea, as they go through their day, how often and how thoroughly their words are replayed and turned over, how often those words become the foundation of hope or the beginning of despair. He doubts it. The doctor is speaking, Jim is grateful that he is a large man with a deep bass. It carries even over to his group.


"She is stable." There's a muttering through the family. Jim can actually see them deflate a little with relief. "She's in ICU for now, but all of her vital signs are good. You can go and see her, if you like."


It seems that her family is still allowing that relief to wash over them. No one responds for a moment, until they can feel that the brusque doctor will recede through that door and leave them hanging, again.


"Is she awake?" Mrs. Beesly's voice is quiet, raspy, but Jim can hear it across the room, just as he can always hear Pam's. He furrows his brow with the realization, and immediately dismisses the thought. There are a lot of thoughts he's not allowing himself, and even in the few hours since this has occurred he realizes that he's getting really, really good at tamping down his thoughts, tamping down his reactions. He would wonder what it means, but the doctor answers.


"No, Mrs. Beesly."


"When......" she falters, leans on her husband's arm. Tries again, "when will she wake up, do you think?"


"Your daughter is in a coma right now." Jim watches her knees fold, watches her husband holding her up, murmuring reassuring words in her ears. Mercifully, the doctor actually picks up on this. "It's not uncommon in head trauma; in fact, it's a way for the brain to heal itself. To recover."


Jim watches the doctor looking at Mrs. Beesly, and Jim is grateful that she is such a kind, warm woman, like her daughter. He knows that in most cases, this efficient and slightly cool doctor would be turned on his heels already through those double doors again. But the doctor continues.


"Ms. Beesly is young, and healthy. Comas in cases like this rarely last more than a few days. I would expect, at her level of responsiveness, that she would begin to come out of it very soon. Maybe even as soon as tomorrow."


The group seems to re-inflate before Jim's eyes, to stand taller and inhale simultaneously. But the doctor, of course, has to add his disclaimer. "We'll just see how she does over the next few days, which are critical. Head injuries can be unpredictable." Jim is surprised to see this last statement seems to make the doctor uncomfortable, he is surprised to see the doctor become aware that he doesn't want to leave it this way.


"But for now, she is stable. You can go in two at a time."



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



Two by two, Pam's family goes in to see her. Jim watches them disappear through those swinging doors, and reappear minutes later. Her mother and father first, of course. Then her sister or sister-in-law, and who he is sure is her brother. Then the other assorted family members who have trickled in; aunts and uncles probably, a cousin. They leave tentatively, and come back looking not much more reassured.


He is sitting now, and he puts a hand over his stomach. Still roiling, nothing in it. Karen is still next to him, in that white coat, isn't she getting warm? "Jim," she says, her voice quiet, "we should go for today, OK?" She is looking at him, he knows she is searching his face. He no longer has any clue what she is finding there and doesn't begin to know how to cover it from her, which he somehow feels he needs to do, but is unsure why.


"C'mon." She says. And she is standing up. She speaks to him in calm tones, in an even voice, and he's grateful for at least that much. "There's nothing more you can do here tonight. It's getting late, you haven't eaten, and she's stable. OK?"


Jim doesn't move or respond. So she continues,


"We'll come back tomorrow. We'll come back tomorrow, and maybe we can go in and see her." Karen has no intention of doing so at this point, but she is shamelessly cajoling him now, getting desperate to get out of here, to get him out of here. She recognizes that part of that reason is in his best interest, and part of it is in hers, and she's not proud of it so she continues before she can ponder it further "....Jim, you can't stay here all night."


Phyllis is prone to eavesdropping, and Jim finds himself grateful for that as well. She speaks evenly, "Karen, you go ahead and go home. Bob and I are going to stay a little longer. We'll drop Jim off at his place on our way."


Karen has no out, no recourse, as Jim doesn't protest that plan. She wants to say "no, I'll stay", and she knows she should say it. But she's exhausted and famished and vulnerable, and wants desperately to get out of here. She would rather go with Jim, but just needs to go.


"Oh.....alright then. Jim, is that OK?" She is furrowing her brow. This is an important answer.


"Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow." He looks up at her, she is starting not to recognize these new looks on his face, but she knows they have absolutely nothing to do with her. She recognizes the wrongness of that and even what it means, but tucks it away for later.


"OK." She leans over to peck him on the cheek. He doesn't respond, doesn't even move.


Bob and Phyllis sit with Jim for 30 minutes more, starting and stopping awkward conversations that they know Jim will have no part in. The Vance's try to talk Jim into coming home with them, but they know he won't. They play at convincing him, until finally they rise and say they'll be back tomorrow morning, and they'll give him a ride home so he can at least shower and change.


Jim thanks them, and they leave. And he's left alone with Pam's family and his roiling stomach, and a whole lot of thoughts he can't allow himself to think.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


It is very late, past midnight, and he is alternately slumping over in his chair or sitting forward with his elbows on his splayed knees, head in hands. He is not drinking water or watching the TV; not reading the paper or magazines. He is not sleeping, though he looks exhausted.


Now it's Pam's family's turn to sneak glances at him. Many have filed out, until finally only Pam's parents are left. They are still sitting by the double doors, standing watch, Jim thinks. And he is still in the opposite corner of the room.


Finally he can feel Mrs. Beesly watching him, and he can feel her crossing the room toward him.


"Jim," He is surprised, a little, that she jumps right in, but he doesn't respond. He's sitting over, staring at the floor, and he can feel his back start to cramp up. "She's OK. She's stable. Do you have your car here? Do you want my husband to give you a ride home?"


He knows this, even through his exhaustion and hunger and pain: he cannot, he must not, look up at her. So he continues to stare at the floor. "No. I'm....I'll just stay here."


She doesn't try to argue with him, she seems to understand. "OK, but listen. There's hardly anyone here, so why don't you go lie on that couch?" She looks over at his face and for just a moment, wants to smooth his hair back from his brow. She is a mother, and it's automatic.


He thinks about that, thinks about the effort it's going to take him to rise and cross the room. It's going to take a lot, but his back is cramping and his neck is sore. "Yeah, maybe I will."


He expects her to leave him now, reassured that he will lie down. She doesn't. She is still looking at him, and he hasn't moved. Her hand is warm on his arm, and it's urging him to get up, it's guiding him up. She stands, his hand under his forearm, and he does as well, and she walks him over to the couch. And because she is a mother, she keeps her hand on his forearm while he sits, swings his legs across the sofa and lays his head on the hard, uncomfortable armrest.


She stands and watches him as he slings that forearm over his eyes, as he swallows. He mutters "thank you", and they both know that neither one of them is going to sleep at all that night-- that first long night.

The light here is beautiful; the way it comes down through the trees, how it wends through the black wrought-iron benches and plays against the patches of grass and pavement. I'm noticing that light as I look around, squinting my eyes as I get my bearings.


It's noisy. There are traffic sounds, but the sounds are not Scranton sounds. The horns are tinnier, higher pitched, as if they are coming from smaller vehicles. There is the breeze through the trees as well, and the cadence of language all around me that I don't understand. It's language without meaning, a symphony of speech without comprehension that draws my ears simply to the sound of it, simply to the rhythm and the melody and the beat of it as it surrounds me.


I am somewhere I have never been, sitting on a park bench, seeing the sunlight bend and hearing a foreign tongue and feeling the newness of that sink into me. Finally, finally, I turn my head to look around.


L'arc du Triomphe. Champs d'Elyse. I am sitting in the Tuileries, and there are French children playing with their mother right in front of me. They are sing-songing in the very same way children everywhere do: how is it possible that children all the world over sing the very same kind of songs? They are sing-songing and chasing each other around her legs. It makes me smile, but she seems frustrated, impatient. I stand. There is too much to discover to sit here, no matter how much I am enjoying these French children. I want to see it all. I rise from the bench.


One of the children bumps into me. I somehow don't really feel that bump. The child, a small girl of maybe five, backs up from me. Her eyes are round as she says a phrase I actually recognize, though so quickly and so naturally that I have to think not only through but around the one year of high school French I took, to also watch her mouth and face to comprehend it. "Excusez-moi, mademoiselle." I smile: here, I am a mademoiselle. Her mother chastises her in French much too fast for me to follow, and I turn my attention away from the family to my surroundings again.



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



I have shoes on, of course; sandals, to go with my long, gauze skirt. This makes me furrow my brow. I'm not given to wearing long skirts, or anything gauzy. I must have bought it at one of the Paris flea markets, though I don't remember doing so. I know the tiles must be cool beneath my feet, but even though I have sandals on I cannot feel that coolness.


There's a hush here as well. I blink and my vision clears. A museum. A vast, quiet museum, but there is still the background of French being spoken, this time by a man. There are no sing-song French childhood songs here, no chastising mothers. It's serious, contemplative.


I am standing in front of the Mona Lisa, and the tour guide, a man, is expounding on the painting in French. I don't need to hear him though. Even through the display case the artwork is so compelling that no one in my tour group seems to be listening to what he is saying, though I assume they all speak French. Mona Lisa is as mesmerizing as I had always imagined her to be. Her slight smile, as I gaze at it, is enigmatic. Well, everyone think it's enigmatic, that's an easy description. But it's also ironic. She has a twist of humor on her face that is uncanny, even disturbing, given the stark background behind her. It's obvious to me that she is not in a happy place; there are not good things going on in her world. Yet, that smile.


I stand for a long time, trying to understand the mystery of her, what secrets are in her smile and eyes. I cannot do it, of course. No one can, which is why she is the Mona Lisa.


The French is getting quieter, farther away. The group is moving on. I take one more look at her, and smile back at her. I think it is also an enigmatic smile. I have some secrets of my own. Not a smile of Mona Lisa magnitude, but a smile of me: of who I was, and who I am, and who I am soon to be. A smile of where I am going, which I somehow know but seems wrapped and hidden from my consciousness. I know it, but I cannot explore it. I know it, but I am not allowed to ponder it. It flitters through my mind—there- and is gone. My gauzy skirt should wisp pleasantly against my bare knees. I am looking forward to feeling this sensation, but I don't actually experience it. I cannot pause to wonder about that, though. We are moving on.



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



Now the waves are lapping against the sides of the boat. It's evening, and the light here is still lovely, still somehow golden. I can't feel the sunlight, but I imagine that it's warm. I imagine that it feels every bit as golden as it looks, playing over the tourists and the water and the riverside, making the scene look less real, more like a painting.


French, again, at a more rapid clip. Other languages are being spoken on this boat as well. These are tourists. I am on a tour boat. The Notre Dame is right in front of me, rising sharp and obvious against the golden light. Unlike the Mona Lisa, there is nothing subtle about Notre Dame. It makes me smile again. Paris, apparently, is a city of contrasts.


The language around me fades away. French, some English spoken in a British accent, what sounds like Italian and Spanish. The language fades away, but the tiny waves on the Seine lap melodiously and rhythmically on the side of the boat. I am tired; it lulls me.

Jim hasn't slept; neither have Pam's parents. He has been lying on that couch for hours trying not to think, trying not to feel, staring up at the ceiling with his arms folded over his chest or closing his eyes with that forearm slung over his face.


He tries not to think about what has happened and what it means, but when the thoughts creep up anyway he knows that Pam had broken it off with Roy, and Roy for some reason was coming after him. It doesn't matter now anyway, it doesn't change what is happening in a room a few steps down the hall, a room he imagines with his every breath but can't begin to know how to enter. So when those thoughts begin to swirl, he pushes them away.


It's more difficult to try not to feel, but also much more important. So that is where he spends the majority of his energy on that long, sleepless night: trying not to feel for Pam, and trying not to feel for this entire nightmare of a situation.


Finally, at around six AM he rises and pours a cup of that awful brew that passes for coffee, way too hot as machine coffee always is, and bitter. He lets it cool so he can drink it one gulp. He crumples the cup, throws it in the trash and decides to mark this new day by again sitting in a chair and not lying on the couch.


Karen comes by early, around eight. She volunteers to drive him home so he can eat, shower and change, but he refuses. When the Vance's offer the same thing an hour later, he rises stiffly from the chair and mutters a thank you. Karen, dumbfounded, says that she is going in to work for a couple of hours, but will be back.


She knows Jim has barely heard her, and doesn't care that she's leaving. And that's when she begins to really watch, and to think, and to make her decision.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


Pam's parents secure a hotel room, and one of their family members has driven the two hours to their home to gather their belongings. They are still desperately worried and afraid, but perhaps less frantic with it, as they settle into the routine of the family of the patient, the ones who worry and wait.


Jim has gone home to shower and change while Bob and Phyllis wait for him in his apartment. He is not going in to work that day; he doesn't even call in sick, and he doesn't care. He throws on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, covering it with a zip up sweater. He runs a comb through his hair and doesn't recognize the look on his face in his own mirror. It doesn't disturb him, though. There is a lot that he won't allow to disturb him in that time of waiting.


Phyllis has thoughtfully packed a bag for him, some things he uses: a toothbrush, stick of deodorant, a bottle of water. And a lot of things he doesn't: some snacks, some sports magazines, the paper. His cell phone.


People come and go on that long day. The doctor still says words like "stable" and "coma" and "young and healthy", and Pam's family still hangs on every word. They still go in periodically to visit her, only in groups of two at at time, per ICU rules. Jim barely glances at them now as they come and go, and avoids their curious looks at him.


His coworkers come to visit in shifts, also a few at a time. Some of them go in to see her: Angela and Oscar, Phyllis and Bob. Jim watches them as they emerge, looking desperately for clues, trying to find in their faces what he can not discover for himself. They go in hesitantly and come out the same way, saying contradictory things like "she looks good" and "wow, she looks really small in that bed." He doesn't know what it all means, it's just words, swirling all around him, but not through him.


He never considers leaving, and he never considers going in to actually see her. He knows she is there, and he can't leave. And that is what he knows, it is all he knows, but it is enough. It gives him a single-minded purpose. Stay here, but don't go in, don't see her. He likes the simplicity of that demand, how easy it is for him to just obey whatever impulse it is in him that is making that decision for him.


In spite of that, though, he understands the reasonableness of going home that night. He is beginning to loathe this room, with it's smell of antiseptic that barely covers the raw scent of sickness. He hates the TV with it's inane programs, all of them shouting at him as through some kind of sound-enhancing tunnel. He hates the chairs and the couches and the coffee.


At 10:00 that night, he thinks: I'll go home at 11. At 11:00 he thinks midnight is a reasonable hour. And at midnight he is watching the late shows, staring at the TV, so he pretends that he forgets what time it is. He watches all the late shows, and at 2 AM figures that it's almost the next day, anyway. So he lies again on the couch, throwing his forearm over his eyes, and actually catches four hours of restless, broken sleep.

He starts that third day just as he had started the second, holding a fetid brew of black coffee, the oily top of which turns his stomach. But he drinks it anyway.


Karen arrives early that morning. She talks Jim into going back to his apartment, and she follows him in her car. She waits while he takes a long, hot shower. She fixes him a breakfast of scrambled eggs and toast while he does so, and he actually eats a couple of bites of eggs, which slide easily down his throat. He doesn't touch the toast, but gulps the coffee, which is blessedly better than the hospital brew.


She notices that he is not dressed for work.


"So, you're going back to the hospital?" She is still watching, though she has pretty much already made her decision. And as she expects, he says it as if there were no other choice.


"Yeah."


She nods her head. It is time. "I'll go with you for a bit." She knows that he doesn't really care either way, so she isn't surprised when he nods again and says "OK."


"I can drive you there, and we can go to work together afterward, if you change your mind." She wonders what she is doing. Why is she even trying? The lengths this man makes her go, banging her head on that futile wall again and again.....


"No, I'll drive my own car. You can follow me, if you want."


She watches him; this really is it. She feels him leave her, she feels herself step away.


"Yeah," she answers.


*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*


She sits with him for awhile. They stay mostly silent, mostly not even looking at each other. She knows she could be anyone to him: Phyllis, or Angela, for all he is paying attention to her. She wonders, briefly, what it would be if it were HER in that bed, and not Pam. She imagines Jim concerned, and worried, but visiting her in that room. Visiting her and talking to her, joking even. Talking with her family in the waiting room, mixing it up with people he knows, and people he doesn't. But she doesn't imagine him sitting harrowed like this, not watching TV and not eating and not talking; not visiting her but unable to leave the hospital. But then, she is not his Pam, she is his Karen. And she knows that nothing is going to change that.


She watches him very closely in those last few minutes, because she wants to make absolutely sure this is right. Because if it isn't right, it will be the worst thing she has ever done to anyone, hands down. And if it is right, it will be the kindest, most selfless thing she has ever done.


"Hey, do you want to stay with me tonight?" It's obvious, but she knows he is beyond subtlety. "I mean...." she fumbles a little bit. "....maybe taking a break from this place would do you some good, Jim. I'll make you dinner, whatever you want, and we can talk."


She gives him credit for this: he actually looks at her. "That's....really, thank you." He hesitates.


"But I'm just going to stay here. Thanks again, though." She nods her head, but avoids the sigh she wants to exhale, because the sigh is going to lead to tears, and that has to come later.


"Yeah," she says, standing, and grabs her cell phone from her purse. "I'm going to make a couple of phone calls, OK? I'll be right back." She know he has heard that she'll be back, and she knows he has heard little else. So she crosses that room, goes into the hallway and pulls the scrap of paper out of her pocket that she had jotted down last night.



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



"Hello?" Karen is relieved, so relieved, that she is home. She has no idea if or where she works, and wouldn't even know where to find her work number. She figures that maybe after six months of dating Jim, she should know these things, but it doesn't matter now.


"Yes, is this Mrs. Halpert?"


"It is, can I ask who's calling?"


"This is Karen Fillipelli."


"Oh hi, Karen. How are you?"


"I'm OK, Mrs. Halpert. But I'm calling about Jim........."



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



Karen waits for half an hour, when she figures that Jim's parents are about 15 minutes away. It's so simple, now, and she knows that she should have seen the simplicity as a bad sign as well. But they'll be plenty of time to ponder over that later. A lot of time, she thinks.


"Jim," she begins. And he doesn't even look at her. He's staring at a daytime talk show, a show she knows for certain he hates. So she tries again,


"Jim. Hey.....Jim." And he turns to look at her. She takes in his face, one more time: it's harder and gaunter, and his eyes are red-rimmed and framed by dark circles. Even when he looks bad, she allows herself to think, he looks pretty good.


Later, she tells herself. Later she'll cry plenty over that.


And as usual she launches right in. "I'm letting you go."


He furrows his brow. "What?"


"You're not with me. Maybe you never were. And before you shut me down or get angry at me: listen. Are you listening." And she thinks he actually is; he's sitting straight up in his chair, alert. She continues.


"I'm not helping you, and I never could when it comes to her. I'm just in your way here. You need to go in and talk to her, and I'm just....in your way....."


"What are you doing?" He doesn't seem angry, but perplexed, as if he really needs help figuring it out, as if he doesn't understand.


"No matter what happens, Jim....I was never Pam, and I never could be. You don't need me right now, you're dealing with enough."


Again, "What are you doing, Karen?"


She sighs. The lack of sleep, the lack of food, is taking it's toll on his reasoning. This may not go as smoothly as she had hoped it might, when she thought it through. "I'm breaking up with you, so you can be free to deal with...... this."


He looks at her now, really looks at her. She is not angry, and that surprises him. He knows that HE should be-- who breaks up with someone while they're keeping vigil over a injured person in a hospital? And the thought actually takes form and shape and has verbalized itself inside his head before he can stop it: A woman who is watching you keep vigil over another woman-- the one you really love, the one you have always loved and always will-- that's who breaks up with you in a hospital.


He closes his eyes. This has added exponentially to his exhaustion. And also, yes...oh no, but yes.... it has unburdened him. He calls himself 1,000 kinds of ass, and is too tired to try to deny it.


Karen watches it all play over his face. Yes, she was right, and yes, this is going to hurt like hell on fire. But right now, she has one more thing to say. "I have called your parents. They're probably in the parking lot right now." She stands. "You need to let them help you, Jim, OK?"


"Karen......" He actually looks sorry, looks torn, and she knows the sorry part is true, but the torn part is just his guilt kicking in.


"Don't worry about it, you can apologize to me later. You can't do it properly now and I can't handle hearing it, so just....take care. I have to go...." She doesn't want to have to pass his parents in the hallway on their way up here. "Jim....let them help you. And talk to Pam."


She says her last sentence to him as she begins to walk away. "I think she may be waiting to hear from you."

I am walking down a sloped street, a street that is covered with cobblestones. The air is warm and humid, different than even the hottest of summer days in Scranton. The warmth is more immediate, requires more attention. I see the people around me, also walking up or down this quaint side street, dealing with the heat in different ways. They are fanning themselves, or moving very slowly, or stopping to set packages down for a few moments, talking to those that are with them or to strangers they see on this street.


I continue walking, slowly. There is no hurrying here. The quaint little town- the sign I pass says it's Ouro Preto-is tucked up on a mountain, and as I wander the streets I walk up and down, and up and down. The houses are close together and the people are genial, though I don't know what they are saying as they converse. I can just tell that the close quarters they live in have taught them to be patient, have taught them to take joy in each other. The heat has taught them not to live at the breakneck pace that we sometimes do in the Northeast, even in Scranton.


There is a marketplace. I can smell the ripe fruit there before I even see it. And the colors- oh those vibrant, lively colors. There are foods here I've never seen, and the men and women working in the booths are calling out to me to buy. It doesn't matter that I don't understand exactly what they are saying. They are handing out pieces of large fruit, smiling, offering them to me.


I smile back, but cannot take the fruit. I can't hold it or eat it, but I enjoy the thought of doing so as I walk along.


There is music playing, the tune is simple but the rhythm is overwhelming. I follow it unthinking. The musicians are taking just as much joy, if not more, in the music as the listeners are in hearing it. There is spontaneous clapping, toe-tapping, dancing. I start clapping my own hands, tapping my toes. Somehow I know this is awkward, because I feel the shadow of uncertainty in my dance, but it doesn't matter. The music surrounds me and overwhelms me, and I step in the middle of the crowd and lose myself in it, throwing my head up to that humid, gray-blue sky and laughing at the music, and the fruit I can't name, and the warmth and closeness of the subtropical mountain air.


The music fades, my feet still, and I sit down on the curb of the street. I think about Brazil- about what it is to laugh and dance; to be uninhibited in the grasping of joy. A thought forms, like a shadow of something gone: I didn't have enough days like Brazil.


I am tired again. My eyes close, and do not open again in Brazil.

"Jim, here. Please, eat something." His mother holds out an assortment of snacks for him. He sighs; she knows he does not feel like eating, but she won't let up on him. She keeps saying that even if he doesn't feel like eating, he'll feel better if he does. He wonders if these kind of phrases are covered in Lamaze classes or something.


He selects a granola bar, tears off the wrapper and puts half of it in his mouth at once. It tastes just about like he thinks the wrapper would taste, which is actually a welcome surprise. He thinks that food that tastes like nothing might be less likely to make him sick to his stomach, a sensation he is still fighting more often than not.


His parents have been dancing attendance around him since a couple of days ago, when Karen called them. He's ashamed that they seem to think that he needs this kind of care. He's a man grown, for pity's sake. But he sees his mother and Pam's mother sometimes talking in hushed tones, and he knows they're most often talking about Pam's condition, but also sometimes talking about him. It bothers him that he has only served to add more worry to the situation, that he can't rise to this occasion and actually offer some support, instead of being a drain. But that's one more thing he can't think about, so he finishes his granola bar and tamps down the guilt.


They managed to talk him into going home the night before, and they insisted on staying with him, though he assured them that wasn't necessary. His mother keeps saying that it's OK that Jim needs support too; that's what families are for. And she insists that if she and his dad weren't here, it would be the Beesly family that would have to worry over him. That one hits home. He knows it's bad enough that he's not being all that supportive, but thousands of times worse that he might actually be so pathetic as to take time and attention away from Pam. He knows his mother understands his disgust at that thought, and is shamelessly using it in order to stay with him.


His cell phone buzzes in his pocket. He walks out into the hallway; it's Michael.


"Hey, Jim. How is Pam?" He's actually not trying to joke these days.


"She's about the same. They keep saying that she should be....coming out of it soon, starting to show some more responsiveness."


Michael comes out with a reassuring phrase, the right words. "Maybe later today, right?"


"Yeah."


"Hey, I just wanted to let you know. Roy came in the office earlier this morning. He's out on bail." This actually pulls Jim a little out of his exhaustion, brings some emotion closer to the surface.



"Why in the hell did he do that? What did he want?"



"He said he wanted to apologize to all of us." Michael paused, and Jim could hear him tapping a pen on his desk. "He looks awful, Jim....really horrible."


Many possible replies go through Jim's head, all at once, and none of them suitable for any kind of conversation in a hospital hallway, where there are upset family members and sick people. So he settles on "Well, I guess that's to be expected. Considering."


"Yeah." Michael pauses. "He also said he wants to apologize to everyone. Said he's trying to make things right. So.....I think you need to be on the lookout for him there."


As Jim snaps the phone shut, he finally feels like he has something useful he can do, for the Beesly family, and even for Pam. He speaks briefly to his parents, and then goes to the main entrance to talk to security.


He figures that Roy will need to try to make amends, someday. But not while Pam is in the ICU, hanging somewhere between unconsciousness and someplace he can't even let himself consider.



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~



Later that day another doctor comes through those double doors. He is younger, not as succinct, and he looks a little more concerned.


"We would have expected a young woman of Ms. Beesly's age, and the type of injury she has sustained, to make quicker progress out of the coma state by now. She's still stable...." he leaves that thought hanging for a second. "....but we're really hoping to see her regain some higher levels of consciousness."

It has to be a postcard, or a picture printed on a calendar with an inspirational saying or a Bible verse blazoned across the bottom. Because it's so starkly beautiful it takes my breath away.


The sky is enormous, the biggest sky I've even seen: blue and cold, unending, with white clouds skittering over it. And underneath the sky, the red and brown and tan cliffs of the Grand Canyon.


I am standing on the edge of one. I look down to see that my shoes are about four feet from a cliff that plummets unfathomably to the valley below. Just that view alone is enough to take my breath away. I step back from that cliff.


Once again my eyes view the horizon from end to end. I gaze long enough to begin to believe that this is a real view, that I'm not watching a movie or seeing a photograph. The Grand Canyon is this beautiful: so breathtaking that I have to stand on the edge and blink, and look again, and look again just to begin to take it all in.


There's a thread of tourists making their way down one of the gentler cliffs on the backs of donkeys. There's a group of tourists above my head, flying over the view in a helicopter. The rhythmic sound of it doesn't belong in this world, but it passes me and the sound is quickly swallowed by the canyon. Behind me, walking and talking and laughing, are tourists hiking on the trail that I know surrounds this south face of the canyon. I don't listen to their words, though I can understand them. The Grand Canyon needs no words.


I stand and blink again, when I open my eyes it's still there, it's image beginning to imprint it's way onto my heart. I sit down in the place I stand, folding my legs up and hugging my knees with my arms, resting my chin on those knees. It's magnificent, incomprehensible. I breath in deeply; the air here is thin, but exhilarating.


I close my eyes, open them. The colors seem brighter, but I begin to notice a coldness in the beauty, a coldness that resonates within me. The coldness settles into awareness. I begin to understand that there is a decision.


I close my eyes but do not open them again on that cliff. I have seen enough, for now. I have seen the Grand Canyon.

It's late at night and there is now no separation between those who are Pam's family and those who are friends; those who are coworkers and those who are the parents of coworkers. They are standing in a group of several: Pam's parents, and her brother and sister-in-law, one of her aunts, and Jim and his parents.


The social worker is speaking and the words are battering around Jim's head, but not landing anywhere. They're just words. He understands what they mean but they don't plant, because as long as they don't plant they have no power over him. And, he hopes, no power over Pam.


"It's pretty critical right now. She's starting to lose more levels of consciousness. There are signs of physical shutdown, as well." The social worker is talking in what Jim knows is soothing tones. She is a kindly middle-aged woman, a woman Jim knows probably has a family of her own, a garden, and probably a dog.


He stares over her shoulder at the TV behind her. He's not watching it, but the pictures change and he finds it mesmerizing, he finds it easier to be mesmerized by that than to pay attention to these words. And there are more of them.


"There's a lot of mystery surrounding consciousness. We don't really know how much patients can hear and understand, but there have been cases where patients have come out of even deep comas and been able to recall conversations that happened around them."


Mr. and Mrs. Beesly are clutching each other; Mrs. Beesly is crying, quietly. Jim looks at her briefly, and something like sympathy crosses his mind. But his eyes go back to the TV.


The social worker continues. "Have you been talking to her? I mean, I know you've been visiting, but it's really important to talk to her, to let her know where she is and that you are all pulling for her."


Mr. Beesly nods. His voice is deep and gruff, but Jim can't look at him. "We've been in there, holding her hand, talking to her." He pauses, gulps. "We'll keep doing it." Mr. Beesly does not call Jim out on the fact that he hasn't been to see her, for which he is grateful.


The social worker continues. Jim knows she has a name and he knows she gave it; he knows it's printed on the badge she wears on her waist, but it really doesn't matter what her name is to him when she has words like these to say. Her voice is even more quiet, even more serious now, if that's possible. "We think that coma patients have to fight their way back. We're not sure about all that's involved in that; as I said, there's a lot of mystery surrounding recoveries from comas."


Mrs. Beesly speaks softly through her tears. "What are you saying?"


The social worker is being careful with these words now, Jim knows. He admires that kind of restraint, that kind of care, and briefly looks at her face as she begins to speak. "We think......we don't know, but we think.....that it takes a lot of effort for a coma patient to regain full consciousness. It takes strong will and resolve." She is being careful again, measuring and considering those words that Jim is disliking so vehemently. "If there were difficult circumstances at the time of the accident......maybe someone, one of you....can talk to her about that."


Jim speaks before he knows he's going to, before the words are even formed in his head. "She had just broken up with her ex-fiance." He looks again at the TV behind the nameless social worker's shoulder. "He's the one who punched her."


No one speaks, no one moves. Jim feels the room start a slow, sickly spin, and finally looks at his mother. She is looking at him wide-eyed, concerned. He looks around the circle. They are all looking at him, but especially Mrs. Beesly with her tears, holding a tissue over her mouth. And he knows she doesn't want to, he knows she doesn't mean to speak, just as he had not meant to several seconds before. He knows she can't help herself; she clutches that tissue over her lips, her eyes trained on his. She begins to shake her head and whispers "no", and he reads all the truth, all of the terrible truth, in those eyes that are so like her daughter's.


It was me, not Roy Pam was upset that I was with Karen that's why she even got back together with Roy in the first place because she loves me she has loved me for a long time and all the stupid games we played back then Office Olympics jinx fake diseases all of it funny and sweet and stupid because there we were right in front of each other and why didn't we ever just speak the truth? And Stamford and miscommunication and separation and misunderstanding and heartache and what is it all for it makes no sense to me and now it's too late it's too late it's too late......


He bends over as if warding off a physical blow and runs to the bathroom, where his stomach is finally able to rid itself of what little is in it. He gets sick again and again and again.
He emerges from the bathroom dry-eyed and far away.

There is wildness in these waves, the crash and boom of them as I stand and soak them in. Because as I am learning, the experience of the Pacific Ocean is not something you see or smell or even taste, though I think if I opened my mouth I would be able to taste that salt water. It's something that courses through you; it's everything.


I close my eyes and the wind plays with my unruly hair, tossing the curls into massive tangles I'm not worried about undoing. It's the Pacific Ocean, and it is on the outside and the inside of me.


It has started to pull at me, I feel what the water must feel as the moon courses through the sky, as it pulls the water to and fro by invisible forces. This water is where I am going, the wildness does not frighten me. Inside the wildness is peace. I am being called, being called by name, I hear my name over and over in the waves and it feels like home. I smile; I know it's an incandescent smile.


And the voice is my mother's. She is standing next to me on the rocky shore. I am not surprised to see her, I turn to her and smile. Her voice sounds like the waves, and like music.


"You don't have to go."


She doesn't understand, and I cannot make her understand. Because it's not her time, because the ocean is not hers, yet. I turn to her. I don't speak, but I smile, and she responds. She is still of speech; I am not-- I am of seawater and pounding waves and the moon that pulls the tide.


She reaches for my hand but I cannot give it to her. But we have this: we say goodbye, and I tell her I love her in sea spray and surf, and I know she has understood. I know she loves me and I want to tell her that it never ends, it never ends, and we will have this love forever, but she wouldn't understand and the water is calling. I turn from my mother; she is gone now anyway. And I'm ready for my toes to feel that water.

"Jim, please go in and say what you need to say to her." His mother is now openly pleading.


He is speaking less frequently now, his face carrying fewer expressions than she has ever seen on it before, even since he has been a very young child. She knows that she is seeing a glimpse of the man he is about to become: Jim, but nowhere near the same Jim. She wonders just what qualities he will be able to afford to keep, and which he will have to discard in order to take his next breath, to put his one foot in front of the other, to find a way to go on living the rest of his life.


He scuffs his shoes along the tiled floor, looking intently at one of the random colored specks that make up the bland, ugly pattern along this wide, cold hospital floor that he has come to loathe. He knows that Pam would hate it too; why even waste color and pattern on the floor of a hospital?


"You need to do this, for yourself. And for her." Larissa closes her eyes, pleading, praying, trying desperately to find the words that will open the lock, that will penetrate the fortress he had been painstakingly building up for the last week. She is entirely unsure that she can find them. Just as she is contemplating what words to try next, he comes out with some of his own.


"I can't do it, Mom." His voice is raw but there are no tears in it. She sighs. So this is it. it's just avoidance of pain, and nothing more. She can work with this, she thinks.


"Oh. So that's it."


"What?" He actually looks up at her, and she feels something like hope begin to form.


"You just can't face it. You're not thinking about what might be best for her, or even for you. You're just running from the pain." She watches him wince and recoil as the words hit home. "You're going to regret that, Jim. And I think you've accumulated just about enough regrets."


He feels the bile rise again, the physical sickness that he knows stems from that mixture of heart-wrenching emotional pain, regret, and now, unrelenting guilt. And since he feels it at that moment, as his mother is calling him out on it, he understands fully that she is right. And that, whatever the cost, he must do this.


He nods, once, looks at his mother and opens the hospital door, the wideness of which he also hates.



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



He doesn't look at her, right away, and it occurs to him that even now he is very accomplished at not looking at her; even now he knows how to soak in her presence without taking her in with his eyes.


He has his hands in his pockets and he stands in front of her bed, shifting from foot to foot and fidgeting while he looks out the window. There are flowers on the windowsill. A thought began to form, to flit across his consciousness: I should have bought her flowers when she would have enjoyed them, when she would have known what they meant. But that thought is gone before he can turn it over in his mind. He cannot afford to think such thoughts, now.


The machinery is still buzzing and grinding, so he concentrates on that. He hates the sound. He hates so much about this place- the sounds, the tile floors, the uncomfortable chairs, the terrible food, the doctors with their hushed tones and their hesitant words. He stands for a few minutes, hating, until his head finally clears and he remembers why he is here.


But he doesn't want to remember, so that thought never takes root either. He shifts from foot to foot again, looking at the mementos that have been collected by her family and placed around the room at various locations, as if she knew they were there. As if she could appreciate them; as if they would bring her back.


And there it is, on that stupid little tray- that useless tray that she will never eat their tasteless jello or pudding or popsicles from. And the first thing he allows himself is anger-- someone put it there for him, not for her. Someone put it there, and he wants to run out of the room and demand to know who the hell it was, because it's so damned obvious it's insulting.


But it works, damn them to hell and back. Because he sits next to her on the bed and his eyes are beginning to cloud over, they are literally swimming, and he can barely see through them. And he reaches over to pick up that little green teapot he gave her, that is so her and so him and should have sat jauntily on his stove every day for the rest of his life, and is now on her hospital tray that she will never use. And he is shaking and can't stop the trembling as he reaches over to take what he can barely see through his tears, and it fumbles on the tray, and he tries to catch it mid-air but he doesn't, and it seems to hang inevitably in the space between that tray and the cold, hard floor but finally, finally, hits. And shatters into many green ceramic fragments.


He knows it is coming before he feels it, and he feels it before he can do anything about it. There is nothing he can do now to stay or lessen the torrent of pain that is raining down on him: not running around the hospital, not driving as fast as he can on the freeway, not standing in the shower for long stretches of time and letting the spray from the nozzle substitute for his tears, not lying in his bed gripping the pillow with white-knuckled fingers and refusing to moan into the mattress. It is here, and he shouts raggedly with the agony of it. He grips her scratchy white hospital sheets with one hand and her hand with his other, as his sobs force themselves so violently from his chest that it hurts him, as he buries his face in her abdomen, as he alternately rails at and begs God: please, God, please, God, please, God, please....as the the tidal wave of grief and pain breaks over him again and again, wave after wave after wave after wave of it.......



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~


A tug.

On my hand, a tug, The waves are still pounding and the sea is still full of life, but there is a tug on my hand. It's painful, I feel it. I FEEL it. I remember what it is not to be floating, not to be body-less, to have form and structure, to be in the world physically. There is pain, and it's attached to my hand. It's being squeezed tightly by the hand of another. As I'm becoming aware of that, I look out over the water. The sound of the waves has become sobs, and the salt-spray of the sea has condensed into heavy, thick drops that rain down on parts of me I have yet to identify. But I still feel that hand, I still feel the pain that I know now is not really pain, it's just the weight of the world, just the weight of it. And I also feel the warmth of that grip, the living and compelling desperation of it.


The ocean recedes and I am lying down. I still feel peace, but a different kind of peace: I am not going out over the water, after all. I am asleep. And eventually, soon, I know I will wake up.


But now, I sleep.



*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*



He comes out of her room an hour later.


He looks at his mother and father, and at her mother and father. His eyes are swollen slits and his frame is gaunt. His voice is barely audible, full of tears, and hoarse. But he seems peaceful.


"She's going to make it."


They stare at him, wide-eyed and hopeful, but wary.


"She came back." And as crazy as he knows it's going to sound, he still hopes they will believe the truth of it. "She came back for me."


He shuffles exhaustedly to the too-short, threadbare hospital couch, flops his long frame down on it and falls immediately into a dreamless sleep.