She was sitting on his floor in front of him. Jim had his legs spread in a wide V allowing her to sit closer to him. She was laughing and leaning into him with every new face he made. She grabbed at his shirt and rested her hand on his thigh, and he thought about how inappropriate this would seem to anyone that walked in on them.


“Would you still love me if I looked like this?” Pam brought her top lip up to her nose and squinted her eyes.


“Would you still love me if I loved you and you looked like that?” He sounded a little disgusted.


Her face went back to its normal shape.


“Why do you always do that? That’s not how you play the game!”


“Oh, I didn’t realize that we had agreed upon a set of rules.”


“Just answer with a yes or no!” She laughed.


“Okay, okay. Let’s go again.”


She scooted closer to him until her knees were touching the inside of his thighs and he squirmed a little, but she didn’t seem to notice.


“Would you love me if I looked like this? He asked as he pulled at his eyelids.


“No.”


“Yes!”


“You know I hate when people touch their eyes.”


“There was no eye touching, just eyelid pulling.”


“Close enough.”


She leaned back and reached into her pocket. Her shirt lifted up and her pants slipped just a little and he averted his eyes even though all he wanted to do was look.


“Would you still love me if I married Roy?”


His face went blank and she saw the color drain from his face. Not the reaction she thought she would see. She wasn’t sure if it was the one she was hoping for because when it came to Jim she was never really sure about anything.


“Wow,” he whispered.


She slipped the ring onto her hand and cautiously held her hand out in front of him.


“He asked last night.”


He took a hold of her shaking hand and his thumb traced over the diamond.


“Wow,” he repeated with even less emotion than the first time.


“The ring is even the right size,” she said trying to sell the idea more to herself than to him.


He hooked her fingers with his own and he still couldn’t look her in the eyes because if he did he knew he’d say something he’d regret.


“Say something.” Her voice was shaky.


“What did you say?”


“I told him I needed time to think about it. So what do you think? Would you still love me if I married your brother?”


He wasn’t sure if he could open his mouth without getting sick. Could he really lie to her? He knew though that he would still love her either way. He should probably just suck it up and lie. If only he could just say it, my brother isn’t good enough for you.


Her phone buzzed across the coffee table and she quickly reached for it.


“Hi.”


He was unnaturally happy that she wasn’t happy when she picked up that phone.


“Hey, babe. Did you tell him?”


“Yeah, I just told him.”


“So does that mean you’re accepting my proposal?”


“No, I just need to think about it a little longer.”


That was a good sign, had to be. He wasn’t really sure what he was hoping for though. For her to choose him instead of his brother? She didn’t even know that he loved her and she would never do something like that. He couldn’t live with himself if she did but he wasn’t sure how he would live with himself if she was married to Roy.


“Don’t do this to me Pam.”


“No, I...” she said quietly as she turned away from Jim.


She got up from the floor and walked into his bedroom and closed the door. He sat on the floor completely void of thoughts and instead a stream of images of Pam flooded his mind.


He had to tell her.


She slowly opened the door and smiled brightly at him.


“I said yes. I’m going to be a Halpert!”


And he couldn’t tell her anymore.


“Congratulations. That’s... great. Just great.”


“Roy wants to talk to you.” She held out the phone for him.


He knew it was coming. How could he get out of this?


“Hey!” He wondered if the fake enthusiasm was too much.


“Hey, don’t tell Mom and Dad yet.”


“Uh, I wasn’t going to.”


“Good, because I was wondering if you could make reservations for Tuesday somewhere nice for us and we could tell them over dinner. I need you to call Pam’s parents too and get them there without making it seem suspicious. So reservations for 7.”


“I actually have to do a lot of work this week and I don’t really have any free time.”


“Come on Jimmy. That’s why I need you to help because I have a work thing too. If you’re going to be my best man you’re going to need pick up some of the slack.”


Jim knew Roy was grinning, probably proud of himself. Thinking that he was sneaky about asking Jim to be his best man.


“I’d love to, but I’m really busy all week. I can make the reservations, but I don’t think I can make it.”


“Pam needs you there.”


He looked up at Pam standing in his kitchen with two beers in her hand still smiling at him.


“Fuck.”


“So you’ll be there?”


“What day again?”


“Tuesday.”


“Don’t you think Friday would make more sense if her parents have to drive in?”


“Good thinking. What would I do without you?”


Pam walked towards him and took her seat right between his legs again. She offered him a beer and continued to smile. She looked so happy, but maybe he could make her happier. He was an awful brother for even thinking that, but it was a thought he had a few times a day.


“I’m not sure.”


“Call me later and let me know the plans and have fun with Pam today. Keep her busy. I need to get some stuff done today.”


His fist balled up when he said that, because he said that a lot. Keep her busy, like she was a child he was babysitting and not his best friend.


“Okay, bye.” He hung up before Roy had a chance to say something that would set him off even more.


“So you’ll be at the dinner?”


“I’ll be there.”


“Good, because my dad is going to be pissed.”


She clinked her beer bottle against his and took a generous drink and Jim took one equally as large. Maybe he’d get so drunk tonight that he’d tell her that he was in love with her. Maybe she’d get so drunk that she’d tell him that she was afraid Roy wasn’t the one.


She leaned forward and so did he. She let her forehead rest against his and she closed her eyes.


“You never answered me. Are you still going to love me?”


“I’ll always love you, no matter what.”


He kissed the tip of her nose and sat back and took another big gulp. He would just have to suck it up because that little kiss on her nose was as close as he would ever get to her lips. Why couldn’t he be the other brother?

He saw her parents walk in first. They smiled at him and her mom kissed him on the cheek and her dad patted him on the back. He wondered if either of them would be quite so happy after the big announcement.


"Pam's not here yet?" She asked.


"She is. Just ran to the ladies room."


"So what did you say this was for?" Her dad seemed anxious.


"I, umm well, I hadn't seen you two in awhile and I know Pam and Roy haven’t had time to make the drive either so..."


"Oh, thank God. We thought Pam was going to tell us that she was engaged."


"As soon as you said your parents would be joining us I thought for sure."


Jim nervously looked for Pam and instead saw the waiter.


"Excuse me, can you bring us two bottles of Shiraz." The Beeslys were going to need it.


Pam walked out of the bathroom, immediately hearing her dad laughing even over the dinner rush. Her face fell when she didn't see Roy sitting at the table and the Halperts already sitting next to her parents. She went around greeting everyone, finally stopping at Jim and sitting next to him.


"No Roy?" She leaned into him to whisper.


"No. It's just 7 now though. How are you doing? You were gone for awhile."


"Yeah, I'm just nervous."


He reached his hand over to hers under the table and gave it a little squeeze. He went to pull away when her other hand covered his. Her hands were shaking and having Jim's hand in between her wasn't really stopping them from shaking, but it was a least nice to know that she had someone there for her.


Fifteen minutes later they were ordering and Pam kept stealing glances at her phone.


"I'll be back," Jim said to the table.


He jogged outside and called Roy. It went to voicemail right away and he didn't know if he should be worried or pissed.


"Where the hell are you? Call me back." He felt like throwing his phone at wall.


She looked up at him hopefully when he entered the restaurant.


"He's on his way," he murmured as he sat.


Why did he lie? It wasn't helping him at all to make Roy seem like a better guy but telling her the truth wouldn't help her either. Maybe Roy would do something right and show up.


"Did you get a hold of Roy?" His mom asked.


He nodded. "Yep, he got stuck at work. He'll be here soon."


He couldn't stop his mouth from spewing out excuses for his brother. But an hour later everyone was finishing up the last of their food and drinks and his excuses were biting him in the ass.


Jim's dad was apologizing to Pam and her parents while Jim silently sat. "I swear if Roy didn't have his head attached he'd forget it at home."


Pam's dad gave a hearty laugh knowing that he wasn't joking about his son.


Jim reached for the bill and slid his credit card between it but Pam's hand grabbed it when he put it on the edge of the table.


"Roy was supposed to pay for dinner," her voice cracked. She reached for her purse.


The table went silent and her dad immediately reached for his wallet not wanting to see the tears in his daughter's eyes fall.


"I got it," Jim said. He motioned for the waiter.


"The dinner was wonderful Jim," her mother chimed in.


"Thank you, really," his mother added.


He reached for her hand again under the table but she pulled away this time. She stood first and everyone followed suit. He hung back taking one final look at his phone. Roy was the biggest idiot he knew.


She had plastered on a smile outside, but all she wanted to do was yell at someone.


"There's a craft fair next Saturday at the fair grounds. Maybe you and Jim could drive up and Jim and Dad could go to a ballgame."


"I'll think about it. If not, I'm sure Jim will go either way."


"I'm sorry honey," her mom said as she pulled her into a hug.


Jim watched as she plastered that fake smile on again. She had it down to an art.


He unlocked her door but she had yet to acknowledge him. He cleared his throat when he started up the car but she continued to stare down at her lap.


"I'm sorry." She didn't look over at him. "I should have told you that he didn't pick up."


She laughed and he gave her a confused look.


"Why do you lie for him and then apologize for the things he does? HUH?"


"Because I hate seeing you disappointed. I hate it more than anything in the world and he always seems to be disappointing you," he yelled back


They were quiet all the way to his apartment. She was speechless. He was right. It was always Jim and not Roy that was doing something to spare her feelings.


He expected her to get out of the car and get into hers right away but she walked with him to his door, her way of apologizing for yelling at him even though he completely deserved it for trying to cover for Roy.


"Sorry," he said.


She shrugged and sulked over to a chair.


"I can't do this anymore," she quietly said.


"What?"


"I'm going to give him his ring back."


He wanted to smile, kiss her, thank God. Instead he kneeled down in front of her and held her hands. He leaned on her legs, putting his head on her knees, and she combed her fingers through his hair.


"What do you think he was doing?"


"Well, it's Friday. So he was probably getting drunk and playing poker."


"I like to imagine that he has another girlfriend. I feel less stupid about getting stood up for a girl than a group of drunk guys."


"Don't say that."


"It's the truth though. I mean, he didn't plan any of tonight, you did, and he can't even make enough time show up. It was his idea! He just had to show up."


She stared down at him with watery eyes and he felt a twinge of panic because that small voice in his head that was always telling him to kiss Pam was now yelling at him to do it.


"I need to go home."


"You can stay here tonight," he rattled off. He felt like tonight was his first and last chance to tell her how he felt and how much Roy didn’t deserve her.


"If I stay can we not say Roy's name for the rest of the night?"


"Absolutely."


He stood and lifted her up into a hug until she was dangling above the floor.


"Do you think I'm making a mistake?"


"No." Betraying your brother for the girl you love, that was a new low. He put her back down and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear.


"We live together. All of my stuff is his stuff. He's the only person I've ever been with."


"You can stay here as long as you need to.”


How could he talk her out of rethinking ending this and still be a good brother? Maybe he just shouldn't bother because eventually he’d have to choose one of them. He still had his arms around her and all he had to do was dip his head and she'd be right there.


"Things are going to be okay," he said.


“Yeah.” He could already hear her taking it back in her own mind.


She slowly pulled herself from his arms. She could have stayed there all night and she was tempted to ask him to just hold her. “Can we watch some crappy movie or something?”


“What do you want to watch?”


“Whatever’s on T.V.”


“Should we change first?”


She blushed at the thought of them changing together, even though she knew that’s not what he meant. The redness in his cheek quickly caught up with hers when he saw her smiling. She followed him into his room and he flicked on a light on his way over to his dresser. He dug to the bottom of the drawer searching for something.


“Here,” he said throwing a t-shirt and shorts at her.


“Hey! Are these mine?”


“They are indeed.”


“Why do you have these?”


He kicked at a penny on his carpet. “They got mixed into my laundry last week.”


“And you put them in your drawer?”


“Yes, but no. I just put everything I had in my basket in the drawer and later when I was looking for a shirt I found yours instead.”


She smiled at him. “Didn’t fit?”


“I have some other stuff of yours too. Another shirt, one sock,” he held up the sock, “and some nylons. I think maybe I just kind of scooped up my clothes last week without really watching what was next to it and it just worked its way in.”


“Jim Halpert, the clothes thief.”


“I was going to give them back.”


“Were you?”


“No,” he laughed, “I was actually waiting for laundry day again and I was going to slip them back into your pile.”


“You know that you can tell me anything. Even if this thing is that you stole my clothes.”


“Didn’t steal them.”


“You so stole them.”


“Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t, but I’m hurt that you won’t take my word for it.”


She shook her head at him.


“Pam, would you still love me if I stole your clothes?”


“No.”


He always thought it was unfair that she always answered with a no and he could never answer with anything but a yes. It was a little telling about the way they approached love. Jim was a wear your heart on your sleeve kind of guy and she had her heart securely in a safe never giving the slightest clue on her feelings for him.


She reached back for her zipper on her dress and for a second he was sure that she was going to let it fall to the ground in front of him.


“Can you get this?”


She turned around and his hands shook as he reached for the zipper.


“Sorry,” he said as his hands grazed her skin.


It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen her in things that showed skin. He could literally remember ever single time she stood in front of him in a bikini. Underwear was different though; it was more intimate and not intended for everyone at the lake to see, and right now he was getting a pretty good view of it.


“Thanks.” She held her dress up in the front as she worked her way into the hallway to the bathroom.


He changed quickly thinking that she’d already be sitting on the couch waiting because she lived to beat him at anything. When he stepped into the hallway he could still see that she wasn’t done changing and he happily sprawled out on the couch fully intending to rub it in her face that he was faster at changing than she was.


He heard a little squeak come from the bathroom. He jumped up and was at the door before the second squeak came. He knocked as he swung the door open; he wasn’t going to give her the opportunity to tell him she was okay. She was sitting on the edge of the tub, cradling her head in her hands. The fact that she was half naked was lost on him when he sat down next to her and pulled her into his chest.


“I shouldn’t have said yes. I wasn’t even sure... wasn’t even sure.”


It was strange how Roy had this power over them. He was the one in the wrong, yet they both inexplicably found a way to blame themselves.


“Don’t Pam. Come on.”


He lifted her to her feet and he finally realized that his hand was pressing into her bare flesh as he led her out of the bathroom to his room. Jim sat her on the edge of the bed and grabbed a large t-shirt from his closet.


“I didn’t do a very good job of not talking about Roy. Why couldn’t he just show up?”


He shook his head at her.


“Up,” he commanded and she lifted her arms over her head. He slipped the shirt over her arms and then tugged at it to get it over her head. “Your head is huge, Beesly.”


She was smiling at him with a tear streaked face and she hugged his neck. When he felt like the embrace had lasted long enough she still hadn’t let go and he was more than okay with that.


“Don’t let go,” she said into his shirt.


“Didn’t plan on it.”


Then before he could even comprehend what was happening she was pulling her head back and looking intently into his eyes and if she hadn’t done it he would have. She kissed him square on the lips. There was nothing about it that struck him as friendly and similar to the hug it lasted longer than he expected.


She bit her lip when she ended the kiss and he was clearly in shock. She wasn’t sure why she decided to kiss him then at the most inappropriate time, but she couldn’t really think of any time that would have been appropriate. He was there, like he always was and it just felt right and wrong at the same time. Now looking at his face she knew she shouldn’t have done it.


“Sorry,” she whispered.


“I—what just—“


“Sorry, really. Can we pretend like that didn’t happen?”


“Pam...”


“I don’t want things to be weird between us,” she uneasily reasoned. “You’re my best friend and I’m engaged to your brother. Please?”


“Pam...”


“Please Jim?”


“Sure.”


He didn’t mean it though. It was the first time in a long time that he had more than just a glimmer of hope that she liked him back as more than a friend and no way was he going to let that go.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit…” she muttered under her breath as she hopped on one foot trying to put her shoe on. Jim was standing at his front door calling her back. Reassuring her that the kiss was okay, that she didn’t have to leave, she was welcome to stay as long as she needed.

She no doubt looked incredibly pathetic in his shirt and her shorts and that one high heel on. She was almost to her car when she saw that truck flying around the corner into the parking lot. She swayed back on her left foot, wondering if she could run back to Jim’s, but Roy was already in front of her, blocking her way with his truck.

“Pam?” He asked before getting out of the truck.

“Don’t.”

“I’ve been trying to call you!”

“I turned my phone off after dinner. You know, the dinner you missed.”

“God, Pam. I’m so sorry, but there was a work thing.”

She laughed at him, at his weak attempt at an excuse and the fact that he thought any excuse would work.

“I’m not lying. This new kid was messing around on the forklift. Knocked over some…” She let out a chuckle. “I’m not lying, Pammy! He broke his leg!” She enjoyed that he could be angry at this moment for her not hanging on his every word. For once she wasn’t eating up everything he was saying.

“I can’t marry you.”

"It was just a dinner!"

"Uh-huh. You're right. It was just a dinner. And this was just a stupid idea we let go too far. You didn't need to propose. You probably could have strung me along for a few more years and I wouldn't have said a word."

"Pam...”

"I'm going to my parents' house. I'll be back on Sunday and we can start separating our things."

"You're not going to talk to me about this?"

"No, we've had this same argument for years and it always ends the same way."

"Pam!"

She moved around him and his hand immediately went for her wrist to pull her back. Once she was facing him again she could see that Jim was just a few yards away from them now.

“Let go,” she said sternly and pulled her arm out of his hand, “that hurts.”

“Listen,” Roy said pitifully.

“I’m tired of this. I’m physically tired of the excuses.”

Jim was now next to them, grabbing Roy’s arm to pull him back. “Come on, Roy.”

Roy seemed calmer once Jim was there. He must have assumed that Jim would make things all better, talk to her about this, but Jim only held onto him long enough for Pam to get to her car. She could see them arguing from her car now. Roy was visibly upset and pushing Jim off.

Jim could already imagine how many neighbors were catching this.

“You couldn’t help me out?” He yelled.

“No, I did that earlier. I covered for you! I covered for two hours and you never showed. You could have at least called. Do you know how excited she was on the way to the restaurant today? Fuck, Roy. She cried in front of everyone when the check came. The whole fucking dinner and you never showed. It was your idea, and that was the worst part.”

Roy stared at him, quietly.

“You have nothing to say to that?”

“I forgot, Jim. Everything at work was so crazy and I just forgot.”

“That’s not…” Jim exhaled. “Wow.” Jim turned to leave his brother standing in the parking lot by himself.

“You’re mad at me too?”

He didn’t answer him though. Just kept walking to his apartment and closed the door. Among the fucked up nights in his life this ranked up there.

---

She let the wind hit her face, closing her eyes for the briefest moment and pinching the bridge of her nose. The pressure, however, didn’t lessen because this pain radiated through her whole body, not just her head. Tonight was one of those life changing nights and she ran.

Pam pulled up to the house an hour after leaving Jim’s and quietly got out of the car, and even more carefully unlocked the front door. She traipsed through the dark house, trying to picture where that little table with all of the knick-knacks and framed photos sat at. On the right.... no, on the left, opposite the coat rack, right? She reached her arm out in front of her hoping to touch the table with her finger tips instead of her body. Just as her hand fell on something the lights in the living room flicked on. Her dad furrowed his eyebrows, mostly at her clothes, but then spoke.

"Roads weren't bad, were they?"

She shook her head no.

"They said it was supposed to rain."

"No rain yet." She fidgeted in front of him, wondering when the lecture would come. "Sorry I woke you up."

"I was up."

"You were up?" She asked unconvinced.

"I had a feeling you'd end up here."

She smiled with those sad eyes, thanking him for not saying a word about Roy or asking about Jim's clothes.

“I’m tired. I’m just going to…” she motioned her head towards the spare bedroom.

Once in the room she dug through her purse to find her phone. She ignored the voicemails and called Jim. She hoped that he wouldn’t answer, that would make this apology so much easier.

“Hey,” he answered. He was already comfortable in bed but still waiting for this call.

“Hi,” she said softly. “That was—“

“Eventful?”

“Embarrassing and shockingly easy.”

“Hmm…” he grunted into the phone.

“Made it to my parents’.”

“You could have stayed here. You should have stayed here.”

She was quiet for a long time.

“Do you want to talk about it? You ran out of here fast.”

“Kind of…”

“Oookay. Well, we kissed,” he started. ”It was nice,” he laughed.

“I attacked you.”

“Is that what happened?” He lifted his chin up to the ceiling and pondered what that would have been like.

“I’m not joking, Jim. You’re the best person I know. The. Best. You never ask anyone for anything and you’re always there to pick up the pieces. And for a moment I wished you were the other brother.” She put her head down, “I know that makes me the worst sort of person, but I just wanted you to know that I didn’t kiss you to get back at him. I’m sorry if it freaked you out. I thought about it all night and I feel awful about it.”

“You caught me off guard is all,” he said with one of the biggest grins he had ever had. “If you would have given me 2 more seconds we’d be having a completely different conversation right now… in bed, of course,” he half joked.

“Thank you,” she whispered, “for not making a big deal out of this.”

“Anytime, but you need to buy me dinner. First base isn’t free.”

“That wasn’t first base,” she said sitting back up.

“Kissing,” he said simply.

“There was no tongue,” she answered back.

“But there was a kiss and now there’s a late night phone call.”

“Kissing isn’t first base.”

“I’m not sure I want to know what you think first base is.”

“Thank you,” she said sincerely.

She felt at peace, she’d figure this out, start over. It was slightly invigorating.

His eyes shot open but it took a minute longer for his body to move as quickly or at all. He rolled to the edge of the bed and contemplated pretending he never heard the door, but the knock came again with more force.

“Coming!” Jim yelled to the impatient person from his same position on the bed.

He fumbled over his own feet, in the dark, towards the noise. He wasn’t sure what time it was but it couldn’t have been later than 5am, he knew it couldn’t be. He cautiously pulled on the window blinds with his finger. Roy. He slowly unlocked the door to Roy’s smiling face.

“Jimmy,” Roy smiled.

Even though he had talked to Pam, this was the first time since Friday that he had talked to his brother. “Everything okay?” Jim asked. Had this man lost it? Why was he smiling? Shouldn’t he be on his knees, in front of Pam, begging her to take him back?

“Fine.”

“Are you drunk?”

“No,” Roy said sounding slightly offended.

“What are you doing here?”

“I wanted to hang out with my little brother.”

“A little early for that.”

Jim rubbed his eye with his left hand as he took a step back and let Roy in. This was nothing new. Roy always seemed to be missing that chip that would keep other people from coming over in the middle of the night, or ragging on you until you broke. In his mind all of these things were appropriate—fun even.

They stood silently in Jim’s living room. Roy picked up a framed photo of Pam and Jim.

“So…” Jim murmured.

“Hurry up and get dressed.” He placed the frame back down haphazardly, only to fix it moments later. “Dad’s waiting in the truck.”

“Did I miss something?” He asked wide-eyed.

“Fishing, Jimmy.”

“Right now? You could’ve called, like, yesterday, during the day.”

“Didn’t think about it until it was too late.” The angering thing was that he was sincere. He probably hadn’t thought about it until it was too late. “It’s cold out there. Bring a jacket.” Jim raised his eyebrows at Roy and sarcastically smiled. “Hey, if you don’t want to go then just say.”

“I’m still waking up.”

“Stop being a girl and get cleaned up.” Roy turned to leave.

“Five minutes,” Jim called after him and Roy gave him a smug smile. Ten minutes later Jim opened the passenger’s door and slid in next to his dad.

“Morning, Sunshine,” their dad said to Jim as he yawned.

“You showered?” Roy asked while eyeing Jim’s wet hair.

“Just trying to wake up.”

“You’re fine,” his dad said to him. “We’re in no hurry.”

Jim settled into the seat and leaned his head against the window, watching the light slowly come over the horizon in the side mirror. He remembered when this used to be fun. Their dad would wake them up, one at a time, always starting with Jim. And Jim would happily follow him into Roy’s room and then into Tom’s room. It was still fun though, Jim just desperately wanted it not to be. He needed Roy to be the bad guy, he needed to be able to hate his brother, but he couldn’t.

“Tom meeting us?” Jim mumbled.

“Yeah.”

“So you remembered to call everyone except me? You've been doing that a lot lately.”

Roy nervously shifted in his seat before turning a knob on his radio and stopping on some random station.

And it was odd how just the slightest hint of disapproval from Jim changed Roy’s demeanor. They all knew that Roy was intimidated by his little brother. Roy tried being a good older brother, but often times it was Jim who did things for him. In school it would just be Jim helping Roy with his homework, and at home it was Jim quietly reminding Roy to do little things. With Pam though, things were different. Jim was utterly in love with her and his normal smoothness with life was gone and Roy seemed to find his. Roy was really good at giving Pam 110% of his attention and that was the way he left them, in love. But then he got back from college and Pam was still the same girl, but Roy had become the same way towards Pam as he was with the rest of his life, neglectful, uninterested, but she didn’t seem to mind and if she was happy then Jim would be happy for them both.

“How’s Pam?” Their dad asked abruptly.

“She’s…” Roy began and then realized that he didn’t know how she was. He looked to Jim to help him out.

“She’s okay. We haven’t really talked much. Still haven’t made up?” Jim asked, already knowing the answer.

“Honestly, she still won’t talk to me.”

“Hmm, sometimes women need time to figure things out on their own,” their dad commented while looking at Jim.

“So, did you bring any food? I’m hungry.” Jim looked out the back window to the bed of the truck.

---

She sipped her tea before adding honey to it. It quickly melted off the spoon and dissolved into the tea, and she brought the cup up to her mouth once again.

“So wait, say that again,” Pam’s sister, Penny said.

Pam placed the cup down on top of the saucer and laid the spoon on her napkin next to it. “I broke up with Roy.”

“Yeah, I got that. It was the other part that I didn’t understand.”

She smiled. “I think I like Jim. I think I really like Jim.”

“Okay, wait let’s go back. So you broke up with Roy.”

“Uh huh.”

“And in that 12 hour time period you decided that you liked your fiancé’s brother, your best friend, Jim?”

“Yes.”

Their mother sat quietly on a bar stool, not saying a word this whole time, just taking every bit of information in for the fifth or sixth time.

“This all seems very wrong.”

“It is, but I’ve thought about this a lot since I got here. Also, I kissed Jim,” Pam said with a cringe.

“You kissed Jim?” Their mom finally said. Both of the girls immediately turned to look at her.

“Yes,” she whispered.

“You didn’t say that before.” Their mom rose from her stool and walked over to the table to sit with them.

Pam couldn’t tell if she was about to be grounded or squeezed for more information.

“He didn’t kiss me back.”`

---

Jim sat on top of the cooler, stretching his legs out in front of him. His brothers were a few yards in front of him, casting their lines so far out that he never heard their sinkers hit the water. Roy backed up until he found his chair with the heel of his foot.

“So how is she? I tried calling her yesterday, but she wouldn’t talk to me.”

“Yeah, I haven’t really talked to her since she left Friday night either.”

Tom and his dad pretended not to be listening but he could see their heads tilt every so often in their direction.

“Well, if you talk to her, tell her I’m sorry.”

“Yep.”

Silence reigned over them for hours. Their dad was the only one that caught anything all morning but threw it back because he deemed it too small. The day was following the normal script of any of these trips until lunch time hit. Roy got up and stood before Jim, willing him to move off the cooler but never actually asking. Jim obliged and opened the cooler as he stood up. He grabbed a beer out and handed it over to Roy and then took one for himself.

“Mom packed some sandwich meat for you boys.”

“Got it,” Jim yelled down to his dad.

He quickly went to work pulling out the food items out of the cooler.

“Bread?” He asked Roy. And Roy handed him two slices out of the bag that Jim had been snacking from since they left his apartment this morning. He slathered some mayonnaise and mustard on the bread and Roy handed him a few slices of meat before he even asked for them. “Here,” he said with a sandwich in his hand.

Roy sat back down but didn’t eat his sandwich until Jim was done making his own.

“You know,” he took a bite, “she’s all I have.”

“Roy…” Those words were a knife into his side.

“No, let me finish. I’m not smart like you and I definitely don’t see myself getting a better job in the next few years. But Pam… she was my one thing that was great about my life. She’s my entire life. When I’m with her I feel like I can do anything.”

Jim hung his head.

“Please Jim, please talk to her for me.”

“I’m not sure if it would make a difference.”

“Please,” Roy begged one more time. “She won’t take any of my calls.”

Jim looked up to see tears rolling down his older brother’s face. He cursed himself. Tom and his dad were no longer pretending to be unaware of the conversation.

“Anything, Jim. If she won’t forgive me that’s it. I’ll let her go.”

“I don’t know. Sometimes you can’t fix these things.”

“Please, Jim.”

“You treat her like shit,” Jim said, unable to hold his tongue anymore. “Do you realize that?”

Roy said nothing but looked at him in shock.

“You have for some time now. You treat her like a burden. Do you know what some of us would do for a girl like that? She’s my best friend and I won’t talk her into being with you again so you can stand her up at the altar this time.”

“You know it’s not like that.”

“I don’t. I really don’t.”

“Come on, Jim,” Tom called out to him.

"Stay out of this," Jim pointed at him. "You weren't there. You didn’t see how excited and nervous she was on the way to dinner. And then she cried at the table… in front of everyone."

"Please, Jim," Roy asked again. "I don't think I can do this without her."

---

She was getting ready to leave her parents' house when she got a call from Jim. Her stomach did flips as he asked her if she was free because he really needed to talk to her and she said yes, smiling wide at her mom and her sister, telling him that she needed to talk to him too.

She fell into the chair behind her."I'm glad you called."

"Yeah," he breathed out.

"So you wanted to talk?" She asked after he said nothing.

"Yeah." He looked over at Roy. “Roy's really sorry. He explained the whole situation to me. You'd be really proud of him. He took a kid from work to the hospital and stayed with him until his parents got there."

She shook her head no at no one. She was surprised that they would do this; surprised that Jim really didn't think anything of that kissed.

"No," she whispered. "I, uh, no."

Things were suddenly back to the way they were before. Jim making excuses for Roy.

“I can’t talk about this right now. I’m… I have to go.” She was crushed, slightly humiliated, at least it was only in front of her mom and her sister though.

She cried the whole way home. She couldn’t believe that she talked herself into believing anything could ever happen with Jim. Better yet, that Jim actually could like her in that way. It must have been her way of coping with ending an engagement and a relationship in a few sentences while running to her car. She was acting like a stupid girl.

---

Roy knocked lightly on the bedroom door, while swinging it open.

"Hey, Pam."

"You didn't have to knock." She didn’t look up from her position on the bed, just continued staring down at her book.

He shrugged and went to the closet, looking at his clothes but never actually taking anything out of it. "I'm really sorry. I know it doesn't make a difference but I really am. It was crazy at work on Friday."

She looked up and saw only his back facing her. It was like he could feel her eyes on him because he looked back at her and she immediately dropped her head back down.

“Can I take these?”

She looked back up at him to see him holding a box of photos. She nodded.

His clothes began piling up next to her on the bed, hangers tangling with every new one added to his pile. She thought it was odd that he had just assumed that he should pack his stuff and not the other way around. His name, after all, was on the lease, not hers. She wouldn’t say anything though; she was probably, hopefully, capable of paying the rent for this house all on her own.

She finally rose after a half an hour of watching Roy pack things and decided to help. It was the least she could do. She opened his sock drawer and looked around for a place to put his stuff on or in. They really should have planned this better, gotten boxes or plastic containers to put these things in. But it’s not like it was something you would plan.

She turned around towards the bed with the whole drawer in her hands, searching for a place on the now covered bed to put it down on. She pivoted on her foot until Roy stopped in front of her to watch what she would do next. She balanced it on her knee and used her left arm to shove over some clothes to clear a spot for it.

“Give me that?” He laughed.

“It seemed like a good idea when I pulled out the drawer, you know.”

“Yeah,” He agreed.

“So where are you going to go?”

“Mom and Dad’s.”

“You don’t have to move everything out right away.”

“Yeah?” He asked hopefully.

“Yeah. I mean, I’m not exactly sure which things belong to—“

“Recliner is mine,” he interrupted.

“Take it, please. That thing is so gross.” She went over to the pile of clothes and removed a shirt from a hanger and began folding it. “It’s going to be weird here… without you.”

He looked at her, hopeful. He bit back a smile. “I can stay if you want. Sleep on the couch.”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“I’m still mad at you.”

“I know.”

“Things need to change. I can’t live like this.”

“Anything,” he said as he approached the bed.

“You need to make me a priority.”

“Number one. I promise,” he said, now on his knees in front of her.

“No more excuses,” she said.

“I can do that.” He grabbed her hands and held them in his.

“I’m still really mad,” she said with more force.

“On the couch for as long as you want.”

She couldn’t really believe she was doing this. She wasn’t exactly sure if this was where she should be headed, but it was all she knew and it was comfortable, maybe not safe for her heart, but neither was kissing her best friend.

She straightened the bowl of chips sitting on the coffee table for the tenth time in the past minute, lining it up with a line in the wood.

“Babe, they aren’t going to care where the bowl of salsa is.”

She pushed the bowl again until it was more inline.

“They don’t care,” Roy said again from the kitchen.

“I care.”

“Hey, where are those little hot dog thingies at?”

“I didn’t buy any.” His head snuck out from around the corner. “We agreed that we needed to cut back,” she continued.

“Five dollars, Pam.”

“On Sundays, Mondays, and Thursdays. Three nights a week. We can’t feed your friends dinner half of the week.”

“I’m sorry. Sometimes I forget.”

“You forget that we can’t feed your friends?” She spat.

“No. Come on. I don’t want to fight, okay?” He wrapped her up in his arms.

"I know," she apologized. "I know."

"I can just go to Darryl's."

"No, you don't have to go. That was stupid."

"Good, because Jimmy is coming over with his girlfriend." Roy grinned widely at her. “Sure you don’t want to stay for that?”

Roy wasn't perfect. He never would be, but he was real and he was in love with her. She spun that ring, that hadn’t been on her finger for very long, around and around. She knew what people thought. She knew those wide eyes with lifted eyebrows and that subtle nod of agreement when she said that they were engaged but weren’t sure when they would be getting married. Her sister was the worse. She bugged her about her confession of liking Jim for two months. She couldn’t understand that it was a silly crush that was not reciprocated. She finally gave up on the third month.

"So girlfriend, huh? Are they official?"

"Uh, not sure. I just figured since he's bringing her over.”

“Cool.”

In those few months she saw Jim take a step back. Preferring to keep things short or talk with Roy when he did call. She figured it was his way of saying ‘make it work’. It was a choice of saving this relationship or clinging to the man that shielded her from the faults of this relationship. If Roy and Pam couldn’t make this relationship work without Jim helping out then it wasn’t meant to be. She appreciated the thought, but she missed her best friend.

She retreated to the kitchen to clean a few pans Roy had dirtied trying to make the hot wings she eventually ended up making. She dipped her hands into the hot water, submerging only half of the pan.

“Babe, when you’re at the store could you buy me some more deodorant?”

“Add it to the list,” she yelled back towards the living room.

Once she was finished she quickly gathered her purse and keys. She liked his friends, she really did, but being squashed between two of them while they clumsily passed a beer was out of the question today.

“I’ll be back,” she said as she sped past him on the couch. “Don’t forget the paper plates, please.” She opened the door only to see Jim there at her front door already. Suddenly she felt like running back into the house. Possibly locking the door behind her. But there he was, less than a foot in front of her, standing next to his date or his girlfriend or whatever she was.

“Pam,” Jim yelled. His voice awkwardly cracking.

“Hey. Didn’t see you there. Scared me.” She wiped her hands on the front her pants, fearing they were still wet from the dish water.

“You know me, always stealthy.”

“Yeah, because if anyone were born to be a spy it was definitely you. You and those ungodly long limbs. What was is that they called you, Agent Stick Insect?”

He let out a hardy laugh. “Worst name ever. You’re losing your touch, Beesly.”

“There have been worse names,” she argued. Her eyes darted to the girl standing next to Jim and then back to Jim, and he stiffened up as he remembered that she was standing there the whole time.

“Katy, this is Pam, my brother’s girlfriend... ah fiancée. Sorry, Roy said you guys are trying to set a date. That’s exciting. And this is Katy… my girlfriend.”

She furrowed her eyebrows at Jim. She realized that not all girls would be okay with the idea of him being best friends with a girl, but being reduced to only his brother’s fiancée was more than infuriating.

“Hi.”

“Hi. Nice to meet you,” Pam said.

“Your house is really cute. “

“Thank you. I like it.” She second guessed her tone as soon as the words came out of her mouth. “I mean—sorry. That sounded weird. Thank you. Sorry.”

Katy looked up at Jim.

“Are you leaving?”

“Yeah, I need to go grocery shopping.” She held up her shopping list for him to see, trying to prove a point, like she wasn’t trying to find an excuse to get out of today.

“Ah, cool.” Jim reached for the screen door. “See ya.”

“Yeah. I’ll be back.”

She watched the two of them disappear into her house and she smacked herself in the face with that flimsy list. “I like it?” She repeated to herself at the door of Roy’s truck.

---

She got out of the truck and slowly walked up to the window, peering in but deciding against going in. It was Jim, and that fiancée comment. Was that what she was in store for? Would she always just be his brother’s wife? She began mentally making a list of reasons against going in. She stared into bridal shop, thinking about how stupid she would look going in there by herself. They really didn’t have the money right now. She didn’t even have an appointment. She really should be grocery shopping. No dress, no wedding, more Jim.

She pulled the door open out of guilt because of her last thought. She was surrounded by white gowns, and she didn’t realize it would be so overwhelming. This was definitely not something you did alone. She fingered through the garment bags, wondering how any of these dresses could seem remotely attractive all bunched up in a bag.

“Let me know if you want to try something on,” the shop girl said from her stool behind the counter.

“I’m just looking. We haven’t even set a date yet.”

“When were you thinking?” The girl asked, now slightly intrigued.

“In the summer, maybe,” Pam carefully answered, fearing it would somehow be the wrong answer.

“Your wedding is this summer and you don’t have a dress?” The horror in her voice was embarrassing.

“I haven’t had time to look yet.” She seriously wanted to bolt for the door now and just bring her mom or Roy’s mom with her next time.

The Indian girl got up and began pulling dresses off the racks on her way over to Pam.

“I’ve had my wedding dress for 2 years!”

“Oh, wow! When is the wedding?” Pam asked and took a step away from the girl and all of the dresses.

“He hasn’t asked yet. But I found the perfect dress and I wasn’t going to let it go to someone else.”

“Isn’t that a little… presumptuous?”

“Only if you aren’t dating someone,” she reasoned.

The girl dragged the 5 or so dresses into a fitting room and hung them on a hook.

“There you go. Let me know when you’re ready to be buttoned up. I’m Kelly, by the way.”

“No, I can’t. I just came by to look. I really don’t have time to try dresses on.” She pulled the strap of her purse higher up on her shoulder like that would show this girl that she meant business. There was a grocery list half a page long in her pocket!

“Let me just say that some of these dresses look amazing in the bags but then you put them on and they look like Lara Flynn Boyle’s pink tutu dress that she wore on the red carpet. And she’s skinny! Could you imagine how bad that would look on you? You should really try them on.”

Pam was about 99 percent sure that this girl she had just met called her fat and didn’t think twice about it.

“I really have to go.”

“Just try some of them on. It’s fun, like playing dress up in really expensive clothes! Plus, do you even know what kind of dress you want?”

“Kind?”

“Strapless, off the shoulder, sweetheart, scoop. Do you want a bustle or a train, or neither? And then there are different types of trains and bustles. Also, do you want A-line, princess, empire-“

“Please stop,” Pam interrupted. “I’ll try them on.”

Pam walked into the dressing room, closing the curtain behind her and sat on the bench in the room. There was nothing really special about any of the dresses hanging in the room. None of them spoke to her, but in retrospect she was sure that no piece of clothing had ever spoken to her.

The first wedding dress was more of a hassle to get on then it was worth, and when she emerged from the dressing room the shop girl swooped in with unpleasant industrial looking clips that did a surprisingly good job of fitting the dress to her body. Pam smoothed her hands over the material a few times before really looking in the mirror.

“See what I mean,” the high pitched voice asked from behind her.

“Sort of.” Pam wondered what exactly she meant.

---

She quietly entered in through the garage again and everyone was still there. She thought maybe for a minute that she could just sit in here and wait for people to leave, but the cold was quickly becoming too much to bear.

“Just a few more hours,” Pam whispered to herself.

“Until what?” Jim asked from behind her.

“Hey. Didn’t hear you walk in here.”

“I thought I heard you drive back up, and Roy asked me to get the other case of beer. What are you doing sitting in the garage by yourself? It’s freezing out here.”

“I was just coming in.”

“And talking to yourself?”

“Just thinking out loud.”

Jim bent down for the case of beer. “Are you coming inside?” He asked when she made no move towards the door.

“Yeah, in a minute. I have all those bags of food in the truck still.”

“Need help?” He asked, putting the beer back down.

“No,” she defensively answered.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Are you mad about earlier?”

“What?”

“About the ‘my brother’s fiancée’ thing. We just started dating last month and I wasn’t sure what she would think about you.”

“Yeah.”

“No, I mean—I’m sure she likes you. I just didn’t want her to be intimidated.”

“Because I’m intimidating?”

“Well, you’re a girl and you know how girls are.”

“Sure.”

“That didn’t come out right either.”

“You don’t have to explain Jim. I understand.”

He tilted his head to the side in disappointment. He was having a hard time separating not being in love with her from not being her best friend anymore.

“She’s really cute.”

“Yeah.”

“Anyways... So you’ve been dating for a month?”

He didn’t answer her though. He wasn’t going to walk into this trap, but this only made her angry and she eyed the door behind him.

“Was it busy at the store?”

“No, why?”

“No reason. You were gone for awhile. Roy was worried. Where else did you go?” Jim took a step to the right to keep her from going back in the house.

“The…umm… store.”

“Where’s the Umm store at?” He joked.

She laughed a fake laugh thinking that would gain her entrance back to the house, but it didn’t. She stared up at him, and she just wanted to punch him or shove him, but then she looked into those eyes and those feelings were suddenly replaced with nerves. Sometimes she wished he’d say what he was really thinking.

“I’m cold,” she smiled weakly up at him and walked around him. “Roy?” She called as soon as she had one foot inside the door. “Can you help me?”

“Pam,” Jim said, not really sure what he was going to say to her. He just needed to get her attention. He needed her not to walk away yet. He just needed her.

She put the bags down on table.

“I got it,” Jim said to Roy.

She turned to look at him. She wished he wouldn’t, especially not after his attempt at talking to her a moment ago, but she wasn’t going to draw attention to her disapproval. And so he followed her wordlessly back into the garage.

This wasn’t what she was going for when she got home. She thought maybe, maybe he would apologize for acting like they weren’t friends. She would talk to his girlfriend. She would be a nice girl that Pam could see herself hanging out with. She would feel extremely guilty for having that thought about not marrying Roy so she could still be friends with Jim. That’s what she had thought, just maybe.

“Thanks,” she said when he placed the last bags on the kitchen counter.

“You’re welcome.”

She sat on the arm of the couch next to Roy once she finished putting away the groceries. She watched how Roy paid attention to Katy as she told a story. She watched as she yelled when the Eagles intercepted.

“How’s the game?” She squeaked over the rowdy group carrying on around her.

And when no one looked at her, except Jim, she walked away to her room.

---

She sat in bed listening to the last person leave and waited for Roy to come to bed, and when she was sure they were gone she put her book on the nightstand and took off her glasses. Roy stumbled into the bedroom a few minutes later. He smiled at her, and if she knew it wasn’t the beer smiling at her she would have been happy to see him. Instead though he said, “Jim’s girlfriend was pretty hot.” He pulled his shirt over his head and pulled back the blanket on his side.

“She was nice.” She corrected him.

“You didn’t like her?”

“I said she was nice. I only got to talk to her once outside.” She turned the light out before falling back on her pillow. “You boys really weren’t in the sharing mood, I guess.”

“By far coolest girl.”

“What?” She said with a raised voice.

“Coolest girl that Jim has dated.”

She sighed.

“You know you’re the only girl for me.”

She could feel him scooting closer and she rolled over on her side away from him only to have him sling his arm around her waist and push up her shirt until his hand was resting on her stomach.

“I’m really tired, Roy.”

He let out a groan.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

---

Jim was lying flat on his back on a bed, and Katy was straddling him. One hand on his stomach and her other with a firm grip on his hair.

She let out a small moan and he moaned something back and she suddenly stopped all movement.

“What did you say?”

“I didn’t say anything.” And he really hadn’t even noticed.

But she was off him before he could say another word.

“What just happened?”

She dressed hurriedly, missing some important items.

“You called me Pam!”

“No.”

“You did!”

“Katy, I think you heard me wrong.”

“You said her name. You moaned Pam’s name! There’s nothing to really hear wrong there. I knew you were acting weird all night, but I just thought you were nervous about me meeting your brother. I knew it.” She paced back and forth looking for her shoe. “Does your brother know that you’re in love with his fiancée?”

He didn’t bother answering her. This whole thing was a bad idea.

“Pammy, my mom said Christmas dinner will be at 4 and she said make sure we don’t forget the pies like last year.”

“Got the pies all ready.” She held up a plastic bag.

“You look really pretty today.”

A large smile spread across her face. “Thank you.” She did a little curtsy with her sweater.

“Before we go I have a gift.”

“I already packed all of the gifts in the car to take with us.”

“This one wasn’t under the tree.”

“Roy.”

He pulled a long box out of his pocket.

“No,” she gasped.

“Open it.” He held it out in front of her.

“You really shouldn’t have.”

“Don’t worry, it’s for the wedding.”

“Roy…”

“Open it.”

She untied the bow that held it together and tore through the wrapping paper. She glanced up at him before removing the top and he nervously rocked back and forth on his feet. “Did you actually wrap this?”

“No,” he laughed at her.

“It’s beautiful,” she whispered before the lid was even all the way off. It was a silver bracelet with six diamonds spread across the chain. “You really shouldn’t have.”

She pushed herself up on her toes and placed a kiss on his lips.

“Put it on.”

“Right now?”

“Yeah, wear it today.”

She didn’t argue with him as he helped her put it on. She twisted it around her wrist on the drive to the Halpert house. She bounced on her way into the house and wasted no time showing his mom.

“Roy!” His mom said in disbelief as she held onto Pam’s wrist. “Wow.”

“I know,” Pam answered for him.

“Merry Christmas, huh?” His mom laughed.

Roy smiled and kissed his mom on the cheek as he passed with bags in his hands.

“Jim! Help your brother unload the truck.”

Jim came down the stairs wearing a ridiculous sweater and only slightly acknowledging Pam with a brief smile.

“I don’t know what’s wrong with that boy. He’s been in a bad mood since he got here,” his mom announced.

Jim jogged across the snow covered lawn and stopped next to Roy’s truck.

“Give me something,” Jim said.

“Merry Christmas to you too.”

Jim stood silently waiting for Roy to hand him something to take in.

“Where’d you get that stupid sweater from?” Roy flicked him in the chest.

“Grandma. There’s one for you too. Mom will make you put it on before she gets here,” Jim grumbled.

“Why are you in such a shit-ass mood?”

“Just give me something.”

Roy handed the heaviest box back to him.

He was really trying his best to not act like an asshole, but staying away from Pam was proving harder than he thought, resulting in him being in an irritable mood on a regular basis. She was the one person that would willingly listen to him complain about work and everything under the moon, but without her he had just been bottling it up. The worst days were the ones he had to be near her. It took every ounce of strength not to just go back to the way things were before. He just had to wait it out. After the wedding he knew he wouldn’t be tempted to say anything. He wouldn’t break up a marriage.

He walked past her on the way into the living room.

“Merry Christmas,” she said as he passed.

“Thanks,” he said without looking back at her.

He missed the way her shoulders slumped when he didn’t look at her, and he missed the way her eyes glossed over when he didn’t notice the present she was holding in her hand for him. Just a few more hours and then he could go home and he could cross another day off of his calendar, signifying another day without Pam Beesly.

“Stop acting like a little shit,” his mom said.

He looked behind him expecting to see Roy standing there doing something stupid.

“You, James!”

“What did I do?”

“If you don’t like the sweater then just take it off, but I swear if you keep walking around this house with that look on your face…”

He smiled at his mom as she tried to think of something on the spot that she would do to him.

“I’m sorry.”

“What’s going on with you?”

“Nothing,” he lied.

“A girl? What’s her name?”

“No girl, Mom.”

“There’s always a girl,” his dad said with a hand on Jim’s shoulder.

Jim looked out the kitchen window and watched Roy chase Pam through the yard and finally tackle her in the snow. He blinked a few times before he could muster a smile.

He was able to stay one room away from Pam for most of the day and no one except her seemed to notice or even care. She spent most of the day in the kitchen with his mom talking and cooking. He found himself drowning out his dad and Roy to hear what they were saying in the kitchen. He had no idea what was going on in her life any more.

He was glad when his grandparents finally showed up and any attention that was on him was quickly turned on his grandma who had slowly been losing her hearing and maybe her sanity. Later, however, he’d be cursing her with every painstaking minute of dinner that he and everyone at the table had to sit through.

They sat her across the table from Roy like usual, but that meant he was seated next to her. He tried to offer his seat to Roy but this time he saw her eyes and the disappointment in them, and he sat instead of auctioning off his seat to anyone that would take it.

“Roy, say grace,” their grandma insisted.

He clumsily stood and grabbed the hands of his mom and grandpa. Jim watched as everyone but him and Pam held hands. She held her hand out for him and he gently took it in his and closed his eyes.

“Dear God,” Roy nervously said. “We uh…”

Pam silently laughed, waiting for Roy to call out “line” any moment. Her body shook with every stifled laugh. Jim opened his eyes back up and Pam was indeed sitting next to him laughing at her fiancé. It had been so long since he had seen Pam this close up. Her fingers were pressing into the back of his hand and into the side of his leg where their hands rested in between them. For a second, between Roy’s ums and coughs, it felt like she was his. That every single eyelash of hers was waiting to flutter against his face in the morning. He pressed his arm into hers, wanting to be that much closer to her, but her eyes shot open at this action and she caught him staring at her. He tried to play it off by making a face and then looking at Roy, but she closed her eyes again, obviously not amused with his sudden friendliness. But the worst part was over; he’d only have to worry about accidentally grazing her hand as they both reached for a roll at the same time.

“When’s the wedding?” Grandma Halpert asked.

“June 10th.” Pam smiled.

“Bet you’re nervous,” She said quietly to Jim. He scanned the rest of the table to see if anyone else had heard her.

“Pam, show Grandma what you got for Christmas,” Roy smirked.

She shook her head no. It wasn’t that she wasn’t happy about the gift, she was. It was the nicest thing he had bought her in their whole entire relationship. She just didn’t feel like leaning over Jim and invading his space when he was already in such a bad mood.

“Let’s see it,” Grandma said as she brought her glasses down from her hair to her face.

Pam pushed her chair out, but their grandma was already reaching her arm in front of Jim to grab Pam’s hand. Jim leaned back, giving his grandma more room to get closer but instead she seemed to be stronger than they all thought and Pam was practically on his lap showing off her new bracelet.

“Just lovely,” she said to Jim. “Reminds me of that bracelet that she made you when you were little.”

“Pretty nice? Huh, Gram?” Roy yelled across the table.

She looked at Jim and Pam, and smiled.

“Grandma, Roy bought that bracelet,” Jim clarified into her good ear while Pam turned her face away from him as she slid back into her seat.

Grandma Halpert nodded her head and went back to her food.

“Are you heading over to your parents’ house today?” Jim whispered to Pam out of nowhere.

“Oh, are you talking to me again?” Pam snapped a little too loud because now the whole table was looking at them.

Pam folded her napkin and pushed out of her seat and excused herself to the bathroom. She didn’t mean to snap, but in the span of 10 minutes he went from not wanting to sit next to her, to trying to laugh with her about Roy, and then to wanting to carry on a conversation.

“What did you say to her?” Roy demanded.

“Nothing. I just asked her if you were going to the Beeslys’ house after this. I have presents for them.”

“Just a lovers spat,” Grandma said.

“No, May. Roy and Pam are engaged. Not Pam and Jim,” her husband calmly interjected.

“What?” She asked.

“Jim and Pam are engaged,” their mom said louder.

“Yes, such a sweet couple.” She nodded.

“No, I meant Roy and Pam,” their mom sighed at her slip up and their dad and grandpa both cringed.

“She’s just confused,” their grandpa said to Roy.

“No, I remember. Jim was always following that little girl around the house. What was that game you would play with her?”

“She’s engaged to Roy, Grandma.” Jim’s heart was now pounding its way out of his chest.

“No, what was that game?”

Jim hung his head, afraid that if he looked at anyone they’d be able to tell how in love with Pam he was.

“What was that game?” She asked Jim again.

“Would you still love me?” He answered solemnly.

She smiled at everyone, happy to have the answer to her question.

He could feel all of these eyes on him, but he refused to give in and look at them.

“Pam will get a kick out of that,” Roy laughed.

He looked up to see everyone at the table except Roy had gotten it. Grandma knew even in her altered state that Jim was in love with Pam, always had been. There was a nervous exchange of glances going on between his parents.

“Get a kick out of what?” She said trying to get into her chair without touching Jim.

“Jim has a little crush on you.”

Jim was a floored that Roy did get it, not entirely right, but he could still see that Jim had feelings other than the friendly kind for Pam.

“Used to,” Jim blurted out, “like, in high school.”

She narrowed her eyes at him. She wasn’t sure if she should be scared that her heart stopped when Roy said that. And she wasn’t even sure what to think of the disappointment she felt when Jim took it back.

Dinner seemed to drag on. Every conversation quickly failed as soon as it began. He needed to get out of this house, but he knew the chances of his mother letting him leave without sitting him down and talking to him were zero. So he slowly climbed the stairs hoping to at least avoid everyone else until the time came. But at the top of the stairs he could already see Pam sitting on his old twin bed. She watched him intently as he came closer.

“You’re a jerk, Jim Halpert.”

He didn’t say anything. He deserved this much.

“You’ve ignored me for how many months and I figure you were just trying to give us space, but then the football game and you acted like weren’t my best friend in the whole world. And each month gets a little worse. So tell me, what did I do to piss you off?”

“I just—“ he paused, trying to think of anything other than telling her I love you. “We can’t be friends like how we were. We’re too old.”

“We’re too old to be friends?”

“You’re getting married.”

“I know this.”

“After you get married we can’t be how we were before.”

“We can’t?”

“We can’t play stupid games anymore. Married people don’t play would you still love me with people that they aren’t married to.”

“They don’t?”

“I’m being serious, Pam.”

“You’re lying.”

“Roy’s not going to want you hanging out with some guy all the time.”

“You’re his brother. Did he say something? Is that why you’ve been ignoring me?”

“He didn’t say anything.”

“Then stop acting weird because I really miss you. I asked you before I said yes if marrying Roy would change things and you said no.”

“I thought it wouldn’t.”

“What aren’t you saying?”

“Nothing, that’s it.”

“You’re not mad that I didn’t talk to your girlfriend? Because if you are then I’m really sorry. I’ve been thinking about it for a whole month. I was rude. It was completely uncalled for.”

“No, not it at all. We’re not eve dating anymore.”

“Really?”

“Really. Wasn’t meant to be.” He watched her face, was that joy that flickered on her face when he said that? “I have a present for you,” he said as he walked over to his old desk and pulled the carefully wrapped box from a under his shirt that he had arrived in. He held it out for her and she finally got up off the bed.

“Did you make it yourself? It’s not a sweater is it?” She joked with the tiny box in her hand.

“Oh, I wouldn’t dare to try and compete with my grandma.”

She carefully pulled the ribbon off it. “Did you wrap this yourself?”

“Too much tape?” He asked.

She looked down at the same wrapping paper she saw this morning. “Way too much.” She smiled. But when she finally got it open she was speechless. Two sparkling earrings were glaring up at her.

“I went Christmas shopping with Roy for you,” he mumbled.

“This is too much, Jim.”

“Think of one of them as your Christmas present and the other as your wedding present. So you can only wear one until June.”

She quickly threw her arms around his neck to hug him. She held him tightly for a minute.

“Hey, Jim, watch were you put your hands, that’s my fiancée,” Roy called out as he passed the room with a chuckle. “That’s too funny,” he said to himself as he continued towards the bathroom.

They slowly pulled away.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“You’re welcome.”

“No more weirdness?”

He nodded his head.

“Swear?”

“I swear.”

He watched her leave a few minutes later with Roy and he wasn’t sure what he had just done. Could he make it six months without spilling his guts and ruining all three of their lives? His mother though, he almost died when she hugged him. She didn’t yell, she didn’t lecture him on boundaries or being in love with his brother’s girl.

“How long?” His mother asked with her arms wrapped tightly around him like he was still a little boy.

“Forever,” he said without hesitation. “Don’t worry though, I won’t say anything.”

Roy had been firmly planted on the couch since he got off from work yesterday afternoon. He ate dinner there, he fell asleep there, and there he still was at 10am on a Saturday morning. That was the guy she was engaged to.

“Where are you going?” Roy asked.

“I’m meeting my mom so I can pick out my dress today and we have a cake tasting at 12:30.”

“Remember that I hate that buttercream stuff.”

“No, Roy, you and I have a cake tasting. My mom has to leave after I pick a dress,” she paused to compose herself. “You knew about this last week.”

“Agh,” he groaned. “You should go with Jim. I don’t know anything about cakes anyways.”

“What are you going to do today then?”

“Nothing.”

“Really, Roy?” She couldn’t even hide her annoyance with him. “Can you at least look at those tapes of the bands?”

“It’s the weekend!”

“Yeah, okay.” She grabbed her keys and was half way out the door.

“Hey… umm… don’t be too long with Jim.”

“Don’t be too long with Jim?” She repeated back to him and he changed the channel. “Why?” He broke his fixation with the TV.

“I just wanted to spend some of my Saturday with you.”

“With me? You can spend some of your Saturday with me now!”

“Just be back before dinner.”

She slammed the door on her way out.

---

Jim had agreed to come with her, the dress was picked out, and her mom had left a few minutes earlier to meet her sister at her school with her monthly care package. Now all she needed to do was wrap up this appointment. She stood in front of 3 mirrors as the seamstresses pinned and pulled at the hemline, and the sales girl hadn’t stopped talking since her mom walked out the door.

“I really like this one. It’s too bad your mom couldn’t stay to see this. Do you want me to take pictures?”

“No, that’s fine, really. She got a ton of pictures on her camera. I don’t think anyone needs to see where the dress needs to be brought in at.”

“She will love these,” Kelly said as she snatched Pam’s phone from the small end table next to the chairs.

Pam bit the end of her tongue. She had read somewhere that the dress buying process would be stressful, she just had no idea that the stress would be in the form of a person.

“Oh, phone call! Do you want me to answer? It’s Jim. Fiancé? He’s cute,” she said while looking at the picture of Jim that had appeared above his name.

“Shoot, can you hand me that? I’m so sorry,” Pam apologized and quickly answered the phone on its 5th ring. “Hey, Jim.”

“I’m here. Are you already inside?”

“We’re not meeting until 12:30.”

“You said 12.”

“Thirty. Check your phone.”

“Well, do you want me to come by and pick you up?”

“I’m getting my dress,” she whispered.

“WHAT?” He yelled into the phone.

“I’m at the bridal shop,” she said clearly. “Can’t really get out of this.” Pam placed her hand over the receiver. “I’m going to take this in the dressing room.”

She slowly backed away from the sales girl and the seamstress, afraid one of them might actually follow her.

“I’m kind of stuck,” she finally said to Jim.

“Stuck in a dress, stuck in a fitting room, where exactly are you stuck?”

“There’s this crazy girl that won’t let me leave.””

“I think that’s called kidnapping.”

“I told her I would come back next week for a fitting when my mom could stay longer but she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She’s scary, Jim. I wasn’t sure if she was going to hug me or spread rumors about me. She called me fat last time.”

“Wow, that is scary and still you went back.”

“I know,” she huffed.

“So how much longer?”

“Soon, I think we’re just about done.”

“Where is this place at?”

“Down the block, so I can be there fast.”

“I can stop by and rescue you from her.”

“You’re amazing.”

“I can caw or bark, maybe hoot so you know I’m there?”

“She will eat you alive. Plus you already saved my butt once today.”

He had figured out his place. It was something like a eunuch. Be Pam’s friend, watch her when it was so called for, entertain her, but never, ever, think about making a move because it was physically impossible. But the problem was that he thought about making a move nonstop. It was a wonder how he kept it to himself this long.

Jim stood at the front counter, peering into the display cases. He crouched down, trying not to look lost and out of place. He felt like everyone knew he was the stand in; that some sign with flashing lights above his head told them so.

“Can I help you with anything?”

“I’m meeting someone for a cake thing.”

“Great, there’s actually a group of you today. Halpert/Beesly?” She asked.

“Yeah. Kind of. How did you know?”

“You’re the only couple that hasn’t been in before for a tasting.”

“Actually I’m not…” He held out his hand for her to shake. “Jim. My brother is actually marrying Pam. He couldn’t make it today.”

“That’s certainly a first,” she said with a bit of disdain.

When Pam finally got there the smell of the fresh baked cakes and breads filled the air, and he knew he’d always associate that smell with her from now on. She stripped her mittens off before she reached him, and quickly reached back to put her hair in a ponytail.

“Thank you for coming. I really appreciate it. Roy was being—Roy today.”

He simply nodded in agreement. “So what’s the plan?”

“Cake, cake, and more cake.”

“That’s a plan I can get behind.”

They stood side by side waiting for the other couples to show up. The lady behind the counter patiently waited for the introductions so she could show them to the back to meet with the baker. She eyed Jim, like she wasn’t sure if she thought he was the sweetest thing for coming with his future sister-in-law or if he was some sleazy, asshole, brother who was trying to get into the bride’s pants. Ironically, he was somewhere in between.

The baker set out several plates in front of them with different cakes. He started from the left with the Red Velvet.

“Red Velvet, Jim!” She whispered excitedly to him.

“No,” he said with a slight laugh.

“You don’t like Red Velvet?”

“It’s just so… red.”

She pouted at him but they still took turns taking an edge off the first piece.

“Nope,” he said once the bite was gone.

“Well, I really liked it,” Pam enthused.

“Next is the lemon cake. Notice the lightness of this one,” the baker announced.

Before he dove into the next piece he took a big gulp of water set out for him.

“Oh my God. Take another bite,” she said eagerly as soon as he swallowed his piece.

He brought his wrist to his mouth to catch a drip of water at the corner, and then he fumbled with his fork, hoping that she’d get tired of waiting. But she didn’t and instead in front of him was her fork with a piece of the cake on the end waiting for him.

“Eh. I’m not really crazy about this one.”

She sighed. “Try it again,” she demanded in a whisper still. His lips closed around her fork and he was already picking up the water to drown it down.

“I think we should keep this party moving, Pam.”

“Keeper,” she said looking down at the plate.

She picked up the plate and moved it to her side of the table. Jim looked up to see that a few of the couples were staring at their exchange. It was that sign, he knew it. Stand In, it flashed brightly above him!

Jim continued not being impressed with each new cake, and one after another she fought him on it with her fork waiting at his mouth begging him to try it again. After all the pieces were gone, and the baker had given them a few minutes to talk while he went to get the toppings next, Pam let him have it.

“You’re kidding me, right? These are amazing, all of them.”

“They are, aren’t they?” He agreed.

He wasn’t sure if she was kidding or if maybe his taste buds took the day off, but for sure the cakes were incredibly dry. There could be no disagreement on that. He was on his 3rd glass of water and the pitcher of water was nearly gone.

“Which was your favorite?”

“I don’t know yet.” He stalled.

She scoffed at him.

After the tasting was complete they both lingered by their cars.

“It was the raspberry swirl!” She yelled out of nowhere.

He held up his hands trying to wave off her suggestion.

“Yes, exactly. You liked that one too?”

“No,” she laughed. “Those were the worst cakes I’ve ever tried in my whole life.”

“You made me try everything twice!”

“I did!” And her face lit up. “I can’t believe you let me.”

“Very smooth. I bow down to you.”

She smiled at him again. “Hey, I feel bad. Do you want to go get some drinks or food or both?”

He looked down at his watch. “It’s kind of late; you don’t need to be back soon?”

“No,” she lied.

---

It was well after 7 when she made it home, and the first thing she saw was Roy on that fucking couch sleeping. She threw her purse down with a loud bang.

“Hey, babe,” he said while rubbing some sleep from his eyes.

“Did you even move today?”

“I made dinner,” he said. “We might have to warm it again.” He threw his head back towards the kitchen, motioning to the set table, candles and all.

She closed her eyes tightly for a second, wishing she could take back the way she came in the house.

“We haven’t gone on any dates in awhile so I just thought we could have a date night tonight.”

He jumped up from the couch and smoothed out his old dress pants he had on.

“You didn’t eat, did you?”

She shook her head no, and she hoped that her breath didn’t smell like her meal from the restaurant. She grabbed his hand as he led her into the kitchen and pulled out her chair for her.

“This is wonderful,” she said. “Do you want me to warm this stuff again?”

“Don’t move. I’ve got it all taken care of. You can open the wine if you want though.”

She reached for the wine bottle sitting in the middle of the table, and she didn’t recognize the label.

“Did you buy this today?”

“Oh yeah, this afternoon. I had to call your mom to ask her how she makes her brisket.”

“You made brisket?”

“Tried,” he added.

She looked back at the pan on top of the stove.

“You know this takes 4 hours to cook?” He served some on a plate for her.

“Yeah,” she answered.

“So how were the cakes?”

“Pretty bad actually. Everything tasted oddly salty, and—“

“Glad I didn’t go.” He cut her off.

He sat down a minute later with his plate.

“I did watch the tapes of the bands though,” he offered.

“Oh yeah, anything good?”

“Nah, not really. Maybe we should get a DJ instead.”

“Yeah.”

She served herself some green beans.

“Crazy weather tomorrow,” he said after a long silence. “Snow or something they’re calling for.”

She took a sip of her wine.

“It wasn’t bad today.”

Her mind drifted back to her first dinner of the night, and how Jim inexplicably disappeared from the table, only to be come back followed by 3 waiters singing some awful birthday song. And she smiled so wide her face hurt. She accepted the balloon from Jim and she hung her head out of embarrassment, but she smiled. Once the waiters left, he held out a fork for her.

“Try it. Promise it will be the best cake you’ve had all day.”

“You know, my birthday was last month, right? We’re stealing from the restaurant.”

“Happy belated birthday!” He called out loud enough to draw some attention again.

“I hate you,” she whispered.

“So you’re saying that you draw the line at birthday songs at restaurants for would you still love me? Interesting,” he pondered with a hand on his chin and the fork still extended out for her. “I better cancel the performance at the wedding rehearsal then.

“The Turner’s dog dug a hole under our fence yesterday.”

“Oh,” she responded, still a million miles away in a restaurant with Jim.

“Hey, I was wondering, if you’re dress wasn’t too much do you think I could get some new tires on the truck?”

She came back to present time. Roy was fiddling with his food and she hadn’t touched a single thing on her plate yet.

“Didn’t you put tires on the truck in August?”

And that was the moment, right there, that she realized that she didn’t have fun with Roy anymore. Their romantic dinner was them talking about their neighbor’s dog and whether or not they should get new tires on the truck before the wedding. And not once did either of them attempt to make the other smile. They were going through the motions and they weren’t even married yet. A little over a month and a half till the wedding…

He was holding her closely. Her head was resting on his chest and they swayed. But every time she looked up it was always Jim. He’d look down at her before lifting her chin so he could kiss her. The kiss was slow at first and then built to a point where neither could keep the beat, and the dancing had stopped. They broke for a second and just as she went in for that second kiss he pulled away…

It always ended there, and thank god. The mere fact that she was dreaming of Jim kissing anyone like that was not right, she wouldn’t argue with you about that. But having the same dream over and over and over, that was something else. She had been having these dreams, these incredibly vivid dreams, for weeks now. And she tried to push them aside. Tried to do anything she could to forget them. She tried falling asleep to different things, things that wouldn’t conjure up images of Jim.

She was at a crossroads in her life. She was engaged, and the wedding was planned, her life was planned, but it wasn’t the one she wanted anymore. She had done this before, decided to go out on a limb, call it off, and acknowledge that she felt something for Jim. To say it ended differently than she expected was an understatement. At the time it seemed like the right thing to do, get back together with Roy. She kissed Jim, she wanted Jim, and Jim asked her to forgive Roy. One of these things was not like the others.

But she thought if maybe, just maybe, she could ask him without any interruptions she could put her mind to rest. She could marry Roy if she knew Jim could never be with her. Even though they weren’t perfect together anymore they at least had a before. And if she really wanted to, and if they both really tried they could make it work again. She could even tell you the moment she fell in love with Roy, down to the exact words he said to her just before it happened. That’s how sure she was about this. With Jim it was just moments over decades, glimmers of something grand and unbelievable. She had always loved him, but she never had that Aha moment. So was it nothing more than love that people felt for their closest friends or was it that Earth shattering love? And that’s why she tried not to let it bother her too much because she knew definitively that she and Roy were in love or they used to be. With Jim it was all a guess, and that’s not how she led her life. She was cautious… Except not today, not after having that dream again.

She got up out of bed and dressed quickly, and left the house before Roy noticed. She walked and walked until she ended up outside his apartment. She paced in front of the building for half an hour before she got up the nerve to knock.

“Hey,” he said to her, but he knew something was off with her.
“Hi. I just walked here, and I had to ask—“

“That’s like 5 miles,” he interrupted. He looked down at the parking lot searching for her car; he thought that maybe she misspoke.

“That um—that crush.” She said it so matter-of-factly that she surprised herself.

“Yeah,” he said swallowing hard.

“You don’t still kind of have it, do you?”

He was silent.

“I was just thinking, maybe…”

“You’re marrying my brother in a week,” he said softly. “It’s kind of…” tricky. He was going to say tricky, but he couldn’t get the word to come out.

“Cool, I just wanted to see…” if maybe you loved me.

It was like there was something in the air, snatching up all of their words before they left their mouths.

They stood there at his door.

“Do you…” love me?

“Do I what?” she asked.

“Want to come in?”

“No, I have to go. I’m…” so embarrassed.

“I…” promised him I’d let you be with him. Not in so many words, but I promised. She smiled at him, and he couldn’t tell if she was sad or relieved. “Roy told me,” he paused this time, not because the words escaped him. He paused so he could hold the tears back because what he was about to say was the truth even if it hurt. He had promised. “Roy told me once that you were the only good thing in his life.”

Her mouth slowly gaped open, and her tongue pressed into the corner of her lips when the tear finally fell. And just as soon as the tear hit her face, she was smiling back at him like it never happened. That night he would wonder if he had imagined it.

“Rehearsal dinner next Thursday,” she said finally. “Don’t forget to pick up your suit.”

She could have said it, she could have told him that she might have been in love with him, but she didn’t often give without getting a little first. Then he reminded her that it wasn’t just them. There were three people involved.

She slowly walked away, and she waited to hear his door close before she would let herself cry again.

“Pam,” he called after. “Let me drive you home.”

She pretended like she didn’t hear him.

She knew the exact moment: 10th grade, May 9th, 2:20pm. He was sweeter back then. He had begged her, pleaded with her to let him borrow her car for lunch. And she told him no 20 times. She told him that her dad would kill her if he saw him driving her car. She and Jim didn’t even dare use her car to go for lunch today. But he continued, and she was already going to be late for class along with Jim who was waiting at the end of the hallway for her. “Fine,” she finally said. She handed him the keys out of her book bag. “Don’t crash my car,” she said. She scribbled down her locker combo for him and told them to put them back immediately when he got back from lunch.

It was the worst idea she had ever had. Up to this point in her life Roy had never done anything to prove that he was the least bit responsible. After gym she ran back to her locker hoping he had listened to her. Her keys dangled from the coat hook.

“Hey,” he said from behind her.

She jumped.

“Thanks for helping me out. You’re the coolest.”

And it was probably just because he was older and a jock, but she blushed.

“I was going to bring you back an ice cream cone but I figured it would just melt.”

She giggled, that was so unlike her.

“Umm,” he stammered. “I picked this out front.” He handed her a tiny yellow wildflower.

She twirled it between her fingers by its stem.

“Thanks.” She turned back to her locker because her face was on fire now.

“Also,” he said. “If you’re not doing anything with my stupid brother this weekend I was wondering if you wanted to go to dinner with me.”

“Like Saturday?” She asked trying to play it cool. She rearranged some books on her top shelf.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, okay,” she said. She turned around to see his face again.

“Perfect.”

And this was the moment right here, it was so uncool and not tough, and it was her making him act like that. He leaned forward and tried to give her a kiss on the cheek, but he missed by a lot and kissed her eyebrow instead.

The bell rang for the last period, it was 2:20, and she had just fallen in love with Roy.

She had let this go further than she thought it should have gone, but it seemed too late, like she couldn’t turn back. So instead she lied to herself. Cold feet, that’s what she told herself. This last month had been nothing but cold feet. Because she did have fun with Roy, they just had an off night and she let that thought of them being boring run rampant. Then there was the Jim thing, it was bound to happen. After all these years of being so close, one of them would certainly bring up the possibility of being in love with each other. This is what she told herself as she buttered her bread in front of 12 of her closest family and friends. She worried that they saw the doubt in her eyes.

“A toast!” Roy said. “To the most beautiful girl that has ever graced my life. I love you, baby.”

They all lifted their glasses and Roy leaned over to plant a kiss on her cheek.

The rehearsal dinner was painful, but Jim was there nonetheless. He was going to see this thing through. He would not be the reason that this marriage ended before it started. Two more days and he’d never have to worry about letting it slip that he was in love with her.

She would steal glances of him when he wasn’t looking. It was stupid to think that he could be in love with her. If he was in love with her wouldn’t he have told her?

Somewhere between the salad and the main course people had started dancing, joining the very few people on the dance floor already. She was going to ask Jim to dance. She knew it was going to look weird but at this point she was done caring. She was about to marry a man she wasn’t sure she was in love with anymore and she had gone to her best friend’s house a few days ago asking about old crushes and she felt like she owed him an explanation. She needed to bare her soul to someone.

“Jim?” She said over the hum of the other conversations that were going on around them.

He looked up expectantly.

“Do you want to dance?”

“Umm…” he looked back at the floor behind him. “Sure.”

She had made it a point not to look at anyone else after she asked. She met him in the middle of the crowd and quickly noticed that Roy was now leading Penny to the floor as well. It was like 5th grade all over again. He made her feel like she didn’t know how to dance. There were several missed attempts of placing hands on each other. She settled for his shoulders while his hands lightly touched her waist.

“You look absolutely gorgeous,” he told her. He didn’t even think about the implications before saying it. He just said it.

“Thank you,” she said. “About Saturday…” she started.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Her hands still awkwardly rested on his shoulders.

“Let me explain, please.” He nodded and she continued. “I was having doubts about Roy.”

“He really does love you, you know.” This is what a good brother did; he reassured the nervous bride that Roy was a good guy and that he loved her with all of his heart.

They were whispering at this point. Her hands slowly eased themselves around to the back of his neck where they clasped together finally and her head slowly drifted to his chest. She was going to tell him because if you couldn’t tell your best friend then who could you tell? “It was me. I wasn’t sure if I still was still in love with him. I’m not sure if he’s the one.”

He froze, causing her to jerk in his arms.

“Are you?” He asked eagerly. “Still in love with him?” He clarified.

“Please don’t say anything.” She stepped back out of his reach.

He had made this whole thing about him and Roy. He always thought he was doing the honorable thing by letting his brother stay with Pam. He would ask her to forgive his brother, but not once did he ever ask her if she wanted to forgive him. He had cut her out of the equation and was going off some stupid unspoken promise.

“Are you going to marry him?” He asked with concern.

“I think so.” She looked over at Roy dancing with her sister, Penny. They were definitely not having the same conversation that she and Jim were having.

“Don’t,” he said. It was the first honest thing that he had said to her in months when it came to her relationship.

“What?”

“Don’t marry him.”

“You told me Saturday…” She stopped herself. Because he didn’t really tell her anything on Saturday and she didn’t really tell him anything either. The whole conversation was an assumption.

“I’m in love with you,” he said abruptly.

She took another giant step back from him, and the song ended.

The crowd slowly dispersed and they were left standing alone in the middle of the floor. She looked around nervously; Roy was back at the table talking with his dad, and Tom and Penny were heading straight for them.

“Can I cut in?” Tom asked Jim.

He wanted to say no, tell him that they weren’t done talking.

“You don’t mind, do you, Pam?” Penny asked while grabbing Jim by the hand and pulling him away.

“Actually,” she started, but Tom was pulling her in the other direction.

She didn’t say a word to Tom. She just let him lead her around the floor as he made inappropriate comments about marriage, and she wondered if he realized what he was saying because the whole conversation was like a list of reasons of why people shouldn’t get married.

Penny, however, was busy making Jim squirm with her observations.

“Promise you won’t say anything?” She asked as soon as they were out of earshot of Pam and Tom.

“Yeah.” He was still watching Pam over Penny’s shoulder.

“I always thought it would be you and Pam.”

“What?” His focus was now on her.

“You two always seemed so perfect together, but you never made your move.”

“I was coward,” he said, and she laughed, but he wasn’t joking.

He thought he was going to melt into the floor, but he didn’t. He finished the dance with her, but before he could catch Pam she had made her way back to the table. She sat down next to Roy and he felt like his life was over. She was going to marry Roy, and he realized too late what he should have done. She avoided looking at him when he sat down.

The dinner was basically over and all he could think about was getting up and leaving, so he did. He walked over to his mom to tell her, but the concern on her face was apparent immediately. He tried to quash her fears by repeating over and over that it was just his stomach and that the meal wasn’t sitting with him well.

“I’m heading out,” he said to the rest of the table.

“I’ll walk you out,” Roy said as if the night couldn’t get any worse.

“I’ll do it,” Pam said with her hand holding onto Roy’s forearm like that would keep him from getting up. She needed to finish talking with Jim. Even though her rehearsal dinner was the last place she should be having this talk with Jim it’s where it started.

“Best man stuff,” Roy said.

She felt like she was watching her future walk out of the restaurant. Roy put an arm around Jim’s shoulder as they left together.

“What’s up?” Jim asked.

“I just wanted to say thanks for everything. Just in case I forget to say it in the next few days.”

He wondered how fast that thanks would turn into a fist if Roy knew what he had just told his fiancée.

“Oh and tomorrow, suits at 9, rehearsal at noon and bachelor party at 8!”

He could see how pleased Roy was with himself that he remembered all 3 of those times.

“Tomorrow,” Jim repeated back to him.

“Drive safe,” Roy said. “See you bright and early.”

---

He had started packing. Not that he had anywhere to go. He just felt like he needed to get away, even for the night. He needed to be somewhere he didn’t have memories of her. But really, that was impossible because she was ingrained in him, she was all he saw when he closed his eyes at night. He threw a pair of socks in his gym bag before collapsing on the edge of the bed. His stomach felt like it was resting comfortably in his throat. Every muscle in him ached, like his body had rejected his decision to come clean and not be man enough to stick around for the fallout.

He rose, finally, taking the bag with him and walking to his living room. He stopped at his iPod dock when he heard that hard knock. And the image of Pam telling Roy what he had said flashed through his head. Roy would race over here to call him a traitor and ingrate or whatever it is that you called your brother that was after your future wife. But he knew she wouldn’t do that.

He knew it was her. She knocked again with more force.

---

She had started in on her nails on the car ride home. She knew the moment that he said that he loved her she would never feel the same way about anyone ever again, including the man sitting next to her. They could never just work on this marriage like she thought they could. Those words broke her into a million pieces.

“You’re quiet,” he said as they pulled into their driveway.

“Tired,” she responded.

“It’s going to be a busy weekend,” he joked.

Once in the house she couldn’t stop thinking about him. She couldn’t stop moving, and this tired bit was looking really unconvincing at the moment. She walked back and forth between the kitchen and the living room, until finally she grabbed the keys he placed on the kitchen table a minute earlier.

“Going somewhere?” He asked as he removed his dress shoes and subsequently reached for the remote.

“Milk. We need milk.”

Just like that she was out the door and on her way to Jim’s.

---

He held onto the door knob waiting for her to speak.

“Why tonight?” She asked. That wasn’t what she had rehearsed saying in the car, but she saw him and he looked like he had been throwing a damn pity party and he had a packed bag sitting next to the door. She wasn’t going to coddle him. If she was calling of this wedding then she wasn’t going to do it without all the facts first.

“I could ask you the same question?”

“This wasn’t about you, tonight, when I told you. You’re my best friend and I had been wondering about loving Roy since he proposed. I wasn’t sure what to do with it or how to say it. But you and loving me… Why tonight and not last week when I asked or in high school?” Her eyes welled up with tears.

“You’ve known since he proposed?” He questioned, but she refused to answer until he answered her first. “I was afraid and you were with Roy. And for years I’ve been…”

“Covering for him,” she finished. She blinked and the tears fell.

“For awhile there I was doing it for you. I hated seeing you upset, and somewhere along the way it turned into something I was blindly doing for Roy. But when you said that, that you weren’t sure that he was the one, I couldn’t stop myself.”

“It was selfish!” She said. She was just lashing out at him because it’s what she wished he’d do to her. She was selfish. She stayed in a relationship because it was safe. She had led on Roy all the way to a wedding.

He had watched it all play out though. He knew that he was the one pushing that doubt she had back down. He was covering it up with his endorsement of Roy each time he did something wrong. And it was hard to tell your best friend that you thought he was wrong. That the man he was endorsing—his brother—was not the right one. She was crying now. He nervously grabbed her hand and pulled her into the apartment so he could finally shut the door. She fought against his arms when he tried to hold her.

“Don’t,” she yelled into his shirt. “Say something!” She yelled again at him. “Yell at me. Blame me for something!” She sobbed.

She stood at an arm’s length from him now. Her hand still tightly grasped onto his shirt.

“Don’t marry him,” he said too calmly for her liking.

She turned away from him, but his hand caught hers as it released his shirt. He gently pulled her back towards him. His free hand went up to wipe her tear streaked face.

“You left! How could you tell me that and leave?”

“I just… You went back to the table, and I saw you with Roy and had to leave.” His thumbs could no longer keep up with the tears. “I am so in love with you,” he whispered back to her. “And I think you love me too.”

She looked up at him through her glossed over eyes and he leaned down to kiss her. She had been giving him that pained look for years, and every time he saw it he felt like kissing her to show her that all was not lost in the world. He was in love with her and he’d do anything to make it better for her. His hand cupped the side of her face as her tears soaked his face.

She kissed him back, she didn’t hesitate. Her hands were in his hair and he was slowly walking them back towards the door. The kiss wasn’t sweet like either had imagined, it was hungry, and sad. Her body pressed against the cold door. He rested his palm flat against the door next to her face, his legs wobbled beneath him as his tongue made its way between her lips. It was at this moment when the kissing showed no signs that it was slowing down when a tear slipped out from the corner of his closed eyes. He prayed that she wouldn’t be able to tell. He should have been jumping up for joy but life caught up to him, and he remembered that the circumstances that this was happening under were the worst imaginable.

She did notice though, and this time it was her hand that wiped the corner of his eye dry. He pulled away from the kiss and rested his forehead against hers. He let out a breath that he felt like he had been holding for as long as he could remember.

“I can’t see you for a few days.” Her hand had tangled with his sometime after they had stopped kissing.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

“I have to do this alone.”

His fingers unconsciously felt for that ring, but it wasn’t there. He held her hand tighter.

She entered the house around midnight. It was quiet and the floor beneath her feet creaked loudly, sending a shiver up her spine with the possibility that it would wake Roy. She imagined him walking sleepy eyed out of the bedroom, maybe wanting to kiss her before bed, telling her that he loved her and then her having to throw all of his words and actions back in his face. When she left Jim's she didn't think that she would come home and he would be sleeping, that she might have to wake him up to tell him that she wasn’t going to go through with this.

The house was a mess in just the hour she was gone. Two beer cans left next to the trash, literally inches away from being where they should be. Plastic wrappers from Little Debbie cupcakes lined the coffee table, and his socks marked his way to the bedroom. She picked them up on her way. She carefully placed her engagement ring that she had taken off in the car on the way to Jim’s on top of their dresser in their bedroom, and she exhaled loudly. She watched him sleep, and realized that this was the last time that he would think they were a happy couple, and the last moment before she wouldn’t have to keep pretending for history’s sake that they were. Roy hadn’t moved once. The only sound in the house was her heart pounding and an occasional snoring noise from him.

She walked over to her side of the bed and sat down and that’s when she finally felt him move. He reached for the body that wasn’t there, and then he mumbled something incomprehensible.

“Roy,” she said with a scratchy voice. The back of her throat tasted sour. “Why are we getting married?”

“We could elope if you want.” His hand touched her back.

He was almost too innocent to handle. It never crossed his mind that she was trying to calling it off.

"No, I mean why?" Her voice squeaked and she couldn’t stop herself from crying for the second time tonight.

He shot up in bed. "Pammy?" He questioned.

"I don't want to get married tomorrow."

"That's not funny, Pam."

"I'm serious." She turned to look at his silhouette in the dark.

"What the fuck, Pam? We're getting married," he paused to look at the clock "In 32 hours. Did you just get back from the store?"

"I didn't go to the store," she answered. "I had to go figure this out. Things haven't been the same for us for a really long time. I think sometime after high school you stopped caring and I stopped caring that you didn't care."

"I care," he protested. "This is just cold feet," he told her. He got up from the bed and turned on the lights in the bedroom.

"It's not. I wish it was. I really do. I've been thinking about this for a long time. I can't marry you." Her eyes followed him as he paced back and forth.

"No! Uh-uh. NO!" He was yelling at her finally.

"I'm not in love with you anymore." The words felt like ice coming out of her mouth "It wouldn’t be right to marry you."

"You're not in fucking love with me anymore!" He shouted and her body stiffened up.

He had yelled at her before, and she at him, but this one was different, it was the voice of a crushed man.

"Tomorrow Pam, we're getting married tomorrow morning!"

"I know," she whispered. She wiped her eyes with her wrist.

"Let's just go to bed. In the morning you'll feel differently. You'll regret this, I know it." He reached out his hand for her to grab.

"I can't. It won't be different tomorrow. I'm so sorry." She pushed his hand away with the palms of her hands.

He quickly turned away from her."It’s just cold feet. Maybe you should call your mom or Jim. Talk to them. They'll tell you the same thing," he pleaded.

"That, that right there is everything that's wrong with us. I'm trying to talk to you! Not them."

"I'm trying, but you're acting crazy. You were fine tonight. What happened, what changed?"

"I haven't been good for a long time, especially this week."

"Is this some weird punishment for not noticing that you were having cold feet?"

"It's not cold feet and I’m not trying to punish you. I'm trying to save us more pain later. It wouldn't work and if it lasted we'd be miserable."

"I'm not miserable now!"

"But I am. Doesn't it bother you that I'm not happy?"

"We're fine, Pam. We had sex two nights ago."

"Yep, we did. All better, right?" She bit her bottom lip furiously.

"That's not what I'm saying. I'm saying people that aren't in love don't do that."

"You slept with Kristen Fairchild a week before we started dating in high school. Were you in love with her for that week?"

He slammed his hand against the wall and she jumped. "That's not what I'm saying and you know it!"

"We had sex because you wanted to. We had sex because I had myself convinced until tonight that I could marry you and just figure out the being in love part later. You don't have to be in love to have sex."

"So it was pity sex?"

"This isn't about the sex! It's about you and me! Don’t you get that?"

"I'm not going to do this right now. You're being irrational. I’m going to bed and we'll talk in the morning."

She stood up as if to tell him they weren’t through talking. "No, Roy, this is it. You couldn't even tell me why we're getting married and the funny thing is I can't tell you either."

"We're getting married because we're engaged! I asked you to marry me and you said yes!"

"Are you in love with me still?"

"Are you kidding?! I wouldn't have asked if I wasn't."

"Say it then, tell me why you’re in love me, tell me why you want to be married to me for the rest your life."

"You're the only thing in my life that I haven't failed at."

"I’m not a fucking homework assignment, Roy. I’m a person!"

His eyes grew wide with the tone of her voice. "We can fix this. Let me fix it."

"You can't fix it. I'm not even sure you know why it's broken."

"You think I don't care. I'll show you I do. Please." He approached her again.

"I miss what we used to be, but we grew up into two completely different people, and we only made it this far because we were so goddamn stubborn that neither of us could admit out loud when we knew it was over. I will always love you because you were my first love, but it's not enough anymore. It's not enough to keep this going."

"No,” he said bluntly. “I don’t know what happened tonight but we’re not calling off the wedding because you have cold feet. We’re not done with this. Was it because I didn’t go to the cake thing?” He asked somberly.

“No.” She shook her head. “That made me mad, and that was the day I figured out that we weren’t really in this anymore. But it wasn’t just one thing…”

“Okay,” he said. His eyes drifted to the engagement ring on the dresser and then back down at his feet.

“I’m sorry,” she said sincerely.

“I just… I don’t understand. You know we can make this work. Maybe we should postpone. Give it a week. Please.” His eyes were tearing up.

“I want to. I really do, but it isn’t going to change the way I feel. I haven’t been in love with you like I should be for awhile.” She turned towards the window, and let the tears fall. “You shouldn’t want to marry me for that very reason.”

“I still don’t believe you. I don’t think you thought this through. Is there someone else?”

She didn’t answer. She wasn’t going to ruin Jim and Roy’s relationship to clear her conscience.

“I’m sorry,” she said again.

He punched the dresser, but it didn’t budge and instead he was left doubled over in pain. “Fuck!” He yelled as he tried to shake his hand out.

“Oh my god.” Pam approached him slowly. She lightly touched the part of the hand that wasn’t bleeding.

“It’s fine.” He winced. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about. I'm sleeping on the couch, and we'll talk about this in the morning." He ripped the blanket off the bed and left the room.

She didn’t sleep at all during the night and neither did he. She heard him walking around the house, sometimes going outside and coming back inside a few minutes later. She cried mostly about what she had just done. She knew in the morning several phone calls would have to be made, cancelling things, calling family, and calling friends. She lay on the bare bed staring at the wall. She replayed calling off the wedding over and over again. She spent the night wondering if she could have been nicer about it, and wondering if there was a nice way to call off a wedding. She second guessed her decision to tell him in the middle of the night and instead of in the morning, but in the end it was what it was. It would have never worked out, she was in love with the other brother and he was in love with her.

At the first sign of daylight she stretched and sat up. Her hand went up to her lips and she thought about Jim. She thought about how much easier her life would have been if she would have given into that feeling, that ache in heart she felt every time she said goodbye to Jim.

Roy stopped in the doorway to watch her. His face looked as hollow as she felt.

“We have to pick up the suits in 3 hours,” he said. “So I need to know if we’re going to postpone it or call it off.”

She shook her head no.

“Yeah, that’s what I figured. I’ll call my parent’s,” he said.

“I’ll call mine.”

He suddenly felt like a stranger to her. Gone was the boy who so many years ago held her tightly on a cold night and told her that one day he would marry her. And gone was the 17 year old girl whose eyes sparkled back at him when he said it. Her parents weren’t shocked. They weren’t exactly happy, but they were relieved that she made this decision now instead of 3 months down the road. The deposits they would lose were cheaper than a divorce. They didn’t really ask any questions, the whens and the whys. There would be time for that later they said.

Roy’s parents though, he was on the phone with them much longer than she was on the phone with hers. She leaned against the headboard and waited for him. She tried to be respectful and not eavesdrop, but it was hard not to catch a word every now and then. She couldn’t imagine the Halperts being angry at her, but she knew it was coming, and she deserved it. She had been part of that family for as long as she could remember and now she was breaking one of their son's heart.

She came out of the room when the talking stopped. He was sitting at the kitchen table, head resting in his hand, while the other was in a loose fist on the table.

“How’s your hand,” she whispered.

“Eh, I think I broke it,” he said nonchalantly.

“You should go to the hospital.”

He picked up his head to look at her. “My mom said she’d call Jimmy and Tom to let them know. She said she’d start calling the rest of our family later.”

“Okay.”

And that was it. He didn’t argue with her about it anymore, in fact, he didn’t say a word to her at all. It was funny how she broke the heart of the man that wasn’t all that concerned about her for so many years.

He was nervous after she left. He knew the possibility of her not calling off the wedding was bigger than he would have liked. She never explicitly said that she was calling the wedding off. He sat in front of the TV all night, sleep would be nearly impossible until he heard something. Then at 7am when he was starting to drift off his phone rang. He scrambled for the phone, tripping over everything on his way. The screen lit up with the word HOME.

“Hello,” he answered, feigning just waking up.

“James, I just talked to Roy…”

“Yeah…” He wasn’t ready to show all of his cards yet. For all he knew the next words that were about to come out of his mom’s mouth were that Roy wanted to remind him to bring the flask today. Not that those words would ever come out of her mouth.

“They called off the wedding.”

His end was silent.

“James, did you tell her?” Her voice was soft and not at all like he expected. “Last night at the rehearsal dinner?”

“I, uh… yeah,” he whispered for no one’s benefit other than his own.

Her end was quiet now.

“Mom?”

“What did she say to you?”

“Nothing, she yelled at me for waiting to tell her until last night. But she had confided in me that she wasn’t sure about marrying Roy and I had to tell her. I couldn’t let her marry him without knowing.”

She sighed. “Your brother doesn’t know or if he does he didn’t say anything about it.”

“Are you going to tell him?”

“No. I’m not.”

“Are you angry?”

“I’m not angry, James. I’m your mother. I am disappointed though. I don’t know why you two waited until last night. Did either of you even think about Roy?”

“I’m sorry.” He hoped for any word other than disappointed. It wasn’t a word that she threw around and when she said it she meant. But they hadn’t thought about Roy and he didn’t feel bad about it. He had spent his whole life thinking about Roy, so he’d take the disappointment.

“You know you’ll have to tell your brother eventually.”

“I know.” He hung his head. “Does Dad know?”

“Yes.

“Is he… mad?”

“Hold on,” she said.

He could hear whispering in the background and his dad clearing his throat loudly into the phone. “Hey buddy,” his voice was almost too cheery, and he knew what that meant, lecture time.

“Hey Dad.”

“How are you doing today?”

“Oh, I’m not so—I’ve been better.”

“Yep, yep.”

“Are you—did Mom tell you about…”

“You and Pam? Yeah, I heard.”

“Did you…”

He had never felt so nervous talking to his dad. He was never afraid of him growing up, just the opposite. His Dad was his idol. But right now on the phone with him, he wasn’t sure he could be a bigger disappointment. He couldn’t even get a sentence out without rethinking what he was about to say.

“You know Jimmy, I’m not mad at you. I’m mad at myself more than anyone.”

“What?” The confusion hit him like a wall of bricks.

“You’ve been looking at her like she was your whole world since the first time you met.”

“Dad…”

“We all knew but we ignored it. We let you suffer through it until you burst. Was your timing bad? Yeah, extremely. But our expectations were worse. That girl had your heart and held Roy’s life together, and we stepped back and wiped our hands of the situation.”

“Gary!” His mom yelled in the background.

“It’s true.” His voice drifted off into the distance, and he could picture his mom’s eyes as huge as saucers when he said that. “We acted surprised at Christmas, but we knew. Pam’s parents, us, Tom, we all knew. We never talked about it, but it was obvious. Roy though, you’re going to have to tell your brother soon unless you plan on keeping Pam locked in a basement for the rest of your lives.”

“I know.”

“What are you and Pam planning on doing?”

“I’m not sure what’s going to happen with us. If there will be an Us. We didn’t really talk about that. I wasn’t even completely sure she was going to call it off. But I’m not going to let her go without trying and I don’t know what that will do to the family and Roy, but I can’t live without her.”

“Don’t worry about us, we’ll live. Roy’s a different story. He’s got a temper. I can’t promise that he won’t try to beat...”

“Gary!” She yelled again in the background.

“But he loves you, you’ll get through it. And if not, two Christmases!” His dad joked.

“Thanks Dad,” he laughed. It was good to laugh again.

“Love you.”

“Love you guys too.”

He thanked God that they didn’t disown him over the phone. He could not take that today. The rest of the day was quiet; he received a few phone calls from people that had been invited to the wedding, but he ignored them. He was just waiting for one phone call that he knew wouldn’t come. She had said a few days and it hadn’t even been a day yet.

He wondered what they were doing, if they were fighting or packing or ignoring each other. The idea of calling his brother had popped into his head a few times, but he wasn’t sure what he would say once he got past the pleasantries. He couldn’t sit there and lie to him. He fell asleep staring at the window, hoping she’d pass by it on the way to knocking on his door

---

June 10th, the day he was sure that would go down as the worst in his life had finally come. It started raining by late morning and the irony was not lost on him. He was on his way back from grabbing his mail when he saw her standing outside his door. She was soaking wet, but it didn’t deter her for waiting at that door that no one was there to answer.

“Pam!” He yelled from the parking lot. “Go in!”

She turned to look at him.

“It’s open,” he said as he neared her.

“Hi,” she said.

She looked tired and worn out. Her hair clung to her face and neck, and still she made no attempt to go inside.

“Hi,” he said back. “I was telling you to go inside. You didn’t hear me.”

“I,” they said in unison.

“Sorry, go ahead,” he told her.

“I was going to call first but I… sorry, can we go inside?”

His eyes looked up at the sky. “Yeah,” he smiled. She hadn’t heard anything he had said.

“I, uh, I was wondering if, after all this… I was wondering if maybe… would you think about… could you…”

“Pam Beesly, are you trying to ask me out?” He smirked.

“Yes,” she affirmed. “Not now, but in a month or so. Could you wait for me? I know it’s not fair to ask you, but I want to do this right.”

“I’d wait a year if you asked me to.”

“Oh well in that case, do you think you could wait a year?”

“Seriously?” He asked nervously.

“No,” she laughed. Her face dropped suddenly.

He hoped it wouldn’t always be like this for them. Laughing one minute and then remembering what they did to Roy the next.

“Hey, do you want a drink? A towel perhaps?”

“That would be nice.”

She stayed at the front door, standing in a puddle. Her feet squeaked against the tile every time she attempted to move.

“Here,” he said from across the room. She reluctantly stepped on the carpet to get it. “What are you going to do today?”

“Oh, you know, the usual.” She squeezed her hair in the towel.

He nodded.

“Do you want to hang out for awhile?”

Her head bobbed back and forth as she weighed her options in her head.

“As friends,” he added when she still hadn’t answered.

“Yeah, I think I could handle some friend time. Could we maybe fit in a game of Would You Still Love Me? in there? We haven’t played since the engagement.”

“About that, I don’t think it’s really fair anymore, since…”

“Since we’ve graduated elementary school? That’s never stopped us before.”

“Since the I love you.”

“Oh, are you trying to say that it gives me an advantage?”

“Huge advantage, monumental advantage.” He motioned with his hands just how big the advantage was.

“I hate to tell you this, but the whole game is rigged. You’ve never said you wouldn’t love me. Not ever, not once.”

“You noticed,” he smiled.

“I notice everything about you.” She blushed.

He grabbed them two beers from the fridge, and she readily took her spot on his floor in the living room waiting for him to come back. She wrapped her hair up in the towel, and removed her sweater and shoes, leaving them in a pile in front of his TV.

“You’re such a slob,” he said as he leaned down and put the two beers on the coffee table.
“You love it,” she said sarcastically.

This was right for him. Looking back on all those years, all the near misses, it seemed like nothing now that they were finally here, that they had made it here somehow was a miracle and yet perfectly simple. He told himself that Roy would understand even though he knew he wouldn’t. Because even soaking wet she was still amazing. And her laugh echoed through his soul while they sat on the floor in front of each other.

It was Wednesday night and everyone had gathered at the Halpert house for dinner. Jim and Roy were in the kitchen doing dishes. Jim washed while Roy dried. And the secret was eating away at him.

“We have to talk about some stuff."

Jim had resolved that tonight would be the night to tell Roy about him and Pam. He knew the longer he waited the worse it would be.

"Thanks, Jim, but I don't need to talk. I know I fucked up with Pam." Roy took a seat at the kitchen table.

"That’s not it. I have to tell you something."

"About Pam?" he asked.

"Yeah." Jim dried his hands on a towel.

"Tell me."

Jim took a second to compose himself. He couldn’t believe he was about to say it. In fact, for most of his life he assumed he’d never tell Roy this. "I'm in love with her."

Roy's face twitched.

"Are you asking me if you can go out with her? Because it's pretty bad fucking timing. We were supposed to get married last weekend. She’s at our house packing her stuff, right now! So I think I’m going to go with no." Roy’s anger was showing in his veins.

"I wasn't really asking if I could go out with her. I'm telling you because I told her." Jim hung his head.

"What?"

"I told her that I love her."

"When did you tell her? Don't say the fucking rehearsal dinner, don't." Roy stood up from his chair.

He nodded.

The fist came at him faster than he expected from across the table, and he was on the floor.

"How could you do that? Fuck you, Jim."

"You know what Roy, fuck you too." Jim wiped the blood from his lip on his hand. "I kept my mouth shut for so long but it didn’t change anything."

"We would be married right now. That's a pretty big fucking change."

"I didn't make her stop being in love with you. I tried to keep you together, but it was like one step forward and two steps back with you. I wanted you guys to be happy, but there was just something in you that wasn’t capable of being grateful for her."

Jim pulled himself up with the help of the counter.

"So what, you and Pam are going to date and I'm supposed to be okay with that?"

"I'm not asking for your blessing, I don’t expect that, but I needed to tell you because I wanted you to find out from me."

Roy's fist came at him again, connecting with his jaw, but Jim swung back at him and hit him in the nose, stunning him for a second. It was the first time in their lives that Jim hit him back like that.

"Fuck," Roy yelled. He pinched the bridge of his nose with one had while the other caught the blood that was coming out.

“Stop it,” their mom screamed as she ran into the kitchen. “What is wrong with the both of you?”

“I told him,” Jim said.

“You knew?” A look of bewilderment took over Roy’s face. “You knew,” he repeated.

“Both of you sit down, right now,” she ordered.

“I’m done,” Roy said.

“Roy, outside, right now,” their dad said from behind.

Jim stood next to his mother in the kitchen and watched Roy and his dad walk out the backdoor. Roy sat on the steps off the deck that led to the grass, and their dad stood behind him. Roy was aggressively running his hands through his hair. He thought at this rate he might pull all his hair out before he made it back in the house.

He wondered what he was saying to him, obviously it wasn’t what Roy wanted to hear, but it was enough to keep him from walking away.

“Jim,” his mom said.

“Yeah, mom?”

She held out a wet towel for his mouth.

“I knew as soon as I saw you coming to the table at the dinner that you had told her.”

“You did?” He asked.

“I was worried that she turned you down. Can you believe that? My other son was sitting next to his fiancée and I was worried that she broke your heart.” Her eyes filled with tears.

“Mom, you don’t have to… Really.”

She leaned down and laid a kiss on top of his head.

“I regret not telling you anything when you said you wouldn’t say anything. I could have stopped this.”

“I wouldn’t have listened.”

Jim looked up just in time to see Roy coming back in the house.

“I’m going home,” he said to his mom. “Thanks for the dinner.”

“Roy,” Jim started.

“I’ll see you guys later.” Roy gave the room a quick wave before going.

“How is he?” Jim asked his dad.

“Not great. He’s going to need some time. Just give him space, probably wouldn’t suggest walking around town with Pam just yet.” Jim nodded. “You got him in the nose pretty good. How’s your mouth?”

“I’ll live,” Jim said. “I think I’m going to go home too though.”

---

Jim had called her, warned her that he told Roy and that he was on his way home. Her dad was in the living room taping up boxes when Roy walked in. He paid little attention to him, but Pam saw the blood soaked shirt and realized that Jim had left out a very important piece of the story.

He sat down at the table where she was packing up half of the dishes they owned.

“I asked you if there was someone else.”

Her dad immediately stood up. She looked back at him and shook her head no.

“I know.”

“Why him and not me?”

“It wasn’t a him or you thing. I was ready to marry you even though I knew it wasn’t right. But at the wedding rehearsal I had to tell someone that I wasn’t sure about it. So I told him.”

“And he what, he talked you out of it?”

“He told me that he loved me and I knew,” she said.

“Knew what?”

“I knew I couldn’t marry you.”

“But I loved you. Why wasn’t it enough?”

“I don’t know,” she said.

“So that’s it, my brother tells you that he loves you and just throw your whole life out of the window? That guy is unbelievable.”

“You know, the week before I asked him if he still had that crush, and I’m not proud of this. That’s when I should have called it off instead of making you go through another week, but you know what Jim said? He told me that you said I was the only good thing in your life.”

Roy was silent.

“He could have told me then and that would have been it. But he loves you and he really thought he was doing the right thing for you. So maybe don’t blame him as much. It was my fault.”

She placed a hand on his shoulder. “You are a great man, and I loved you, and I should have been strong enough to tell you when I knew it wasn’t working anymore.” Pam looked over at her dad who had heard the whole thing and she knew that she’d have to go home and tell them everything now. “We’re going to get out of here. I’ll probably be back in the afternoon to pack more.”

“Yeah, okay.”

She left a plate only half wrapped in newspaper on the table.

“Put some ice on that hand again and your nose.” She told Roy. “Ready?” She asked her dad who was already waiting by the door for her, keys in hand.

He was shockingly quiet, not that her dad was a man of many words, but she expected more than an occasional clearing of his throat.

“Jim, huh?” Her dad asked when they were finally on the highway.

“Yeah Jim.”

“He’s a good guy.” He took his eyes off the road for a second to smile at her.

“I know, Dad.” She smiled and then rested her head against the window.

It wasn’t a Jim or Roy thing, and although she compared them a lot when Jim was just her best friend and Roy was her boyfriend, it was different now. She didn’t love Jim because he was all the things his brother wasn’t. She loved Jim because he made her feel like she was the only person in the room. She loved him because when he said it she didn’t question it, she knew, she could feel it. She loved him because for her he was the only man in the room now.

It had been barely a week and she had inexplicably found herself in his bed. She kept telling herself that it wasn’t too bad, she was still fully clothed, and the kissing was chaste-ish. She had only stopped by on the way from signing the lease to her new apartment and… actually she wasn’t sure how they ended up here.

"Jim, your face," she said. She touched the corner of his mouth and he winced.

"I can't say that this is a new reaction to my face,” he joked.

"Does it hurt?"

"I'll be okay. It's not anything I haven't had before. You said you had some news."

"Yes!” She said. “I am the proud renter of a one bedroom apartment.”

“What’s the square footage of that?” He reached for the papers she had in her hand.

“Not important.” She pulled the papers back.

“You should have let me come with you.”

“I wanted to do this one alone. Kind of a testament to my independence.”

“Picture?”

“Yes, I think this is a picture worthy moment. Not to toot my own horn, but you should have seen me in there. I was haggling a bit.”

“On an apartment? How did that go for you?”He asked with some skepticism.

“Not well.”

She followed him to his bedroom where he rummaged through several drawers looking for the camera.

The camera! They came in here for a camera but that was completely unimportant right now because Jim was on top of her, breathing heavily, his hand firmly holding her hip. His thumb tickled the exposed skin and she would crack a smile against his cheek.

Pam watched the room get darker and darker as the sun set. And with each passing moment she seemed to be losing control.

“We should slow down,” she whispered. She didn’t actually think they should, but it had only been a week.

“Yeah,” he said before planting a kiss on her collarbone. “Five more minutes?”

Her mind wandered to all the places that this could go in five minutes.

“Okay.”

His lips immediately went back to hers for a second before pulling back. “You didn’t really specify what we could do in those five minutes.” He raised an eyebrow at her.

Her lips pursed. “No.”

“I figured I’d ask. You never know.”

His tongue slipped back into her mouth with great ease. Despite her suggestion she seemed to be doing everything in her power to keep this going. When his hands lingered around her shirt she sat up and pulled it over her head and then reached for his. He took a second to take her in, and he didn’t care that she could see his eyes travelling up and down her body. “Dear God,” he proclaimed.

“Subtle Jim.”

“I’ll work on that.”

She lowered herself back down on the pillow and he followed her, but her bare stomach and breasts were pressing against his chest, and that five minute deadline was fast approaching. He could feel himself becoming more aroused and he tried to think about anything that would slow this down for him.

She ran her hands up his back; her nails lightly grazed his skin. His hips pressed into hers and she moaned.

“Fuck,” he slurred. He had created an animal, there was no stopping her. “We should probably slow this down," he said with a slight grunt at the end. She nodded, but kept kissing him. "If we don’t stop now we will seriously be not sticking to that one month that you needed.” She said nothing as she kissed his jaw. “Is that your phone?”

Pam paused for a second to listen for the ring. “Mmhmm.” She nodded.

It rang several more times before stopping.

“Okay,” he sighed. "Small, tiny break." He rolled off her so he was lying flat on his back right next to her. His hands tucked themselves behind his head and he sighed.

She was on her side facing him now. She placed one hand on his stomach, as she not so subtly took her turn to burn the image of his half naked body into her mind.

“I didn’t want to stop, but…”

“Yeah, you sleep with me and that’s it. Magic is gone. You never call me again,” Pam quipped.

“Exactly! And if I don’t have you as my friend with benefits what will I do when my girlfriend is out of town?”

“I guess you could call your girlfriend to…” Her eyes drifted down to his crotch.

He laughed hysterically. “Who are you, and what have you done with Pam?”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“I like this,” he said.

“Making out?” She sat up on her knees so she could have a better view of his face.

He pulled an arm out from behind his head to reach for her. Pam laid her head down on his chest, and his arm wrapped around her.

“I like this,” he said again. “You and me.”

“I wanted to tell you that I…”

Jim’s phone rang this time, interrupting her.

“I think that’s mine this time.”

He pushed up from the bed to find his phone.

In the distance Pam could hear Jim talking on the phone.

“Yes, this is Jim." He paused. "Is he okay?” He paused. “Did he hurt anyone?” He paused. “Good. Umm…so can I just come and pick him up?” Jim was now in the doorway looking at her. “Okay, I’ll be right there.”

“What’s going on?” She was sitting up in the bed. She could read that look on his face a mile away. It was Roy.

“He got pulled over at 8:30. He was drunk.”

“But he’s okay, right?”

“Yeah, they’re letting me pick him up. He refused the breathalyzer so they’re releasing him to me.”

“Do you want me to go with you?”

“No, that would probably not be a great idea.”

“Yeah.”

He picked up his shirt from the edge of the bed.

“Don’t leave.”

“I have to go back to my parents' house either way. I don’t mind driving tonight. Moving tomorrow.”

“It’s late. You can sleep here. Go back in the morning.”

“No, don’t worry about me. Go pick up Roy. I’ll call you in the morning.” She got up to kiss him once more.

“You’re amazing.”

She slipped her shirt on while following him through the apartment, and at the front door she slipped her sandals back on. She grasped the doorknob behind her. Her fingers tightly pulling on it, preparing to pull it open any second and run.

“Hey,” she said awkwardly. She pulled him by the shirt until he was kissing her again. “I love you,” she said quickly when she pulled away and turned the door knob to leave.

“Hey,” he said, catching her hand. His smile was contagious. “You can’t say that and just sneak out.”

“You have to go; we’ll talk about it later.” She giddily walked away.

“Love you,” he called after her.

---

When he arrived at the police station Roy was sitting handcuffed in a chair. He kept his head down as Jim approached the front desk. He was nervous, like if he said the wrong thing he’d get arrested.

“Hi, I got a call about my brother.” He glanced at Roy in the chair.

“Ah, Mr. Halpert,” the older officer said. “Royson over here has had quite the night.”

Roy finally looked up at them.

“Jimmy,” he slurred. “I tried to call Pam!”

“Is there anything that I have to sign for him?” Jim asked.

Jim kept an eye on Roy while the officer explained that the truck was impounded and that his license had been revoked. Any other time he’d feel responsible for this, but not this time. Roy was an adult and the fact that he had been pulled over for drinking and driving was just stupid. He knew he was in pain, that this breakup had been harder than he could imagine and he was partly to blame, but Roy couldn't keep acting like this. There had to be a point where he realized his actions had consequences.

Roy stumbled after him to his car. He repeated Jim’s name over and over until Jim snapped.

“Get in the fucking car, Roy.”

Roy froze.

“Now,” Jim yelled. “You know, I just don’t understand you, I really don’t. We have literally handed you everything, EVERYTHING! And you trash it. I can’t keep bailing you out of stuff. I don’t know if you know this, but I would like to live my life too.”

They both got in the car and Roy clutched the door handle.

“Seat belt,” Jim yelled at him again.

He clumsily pulled the seat belt across.

“Tell me Roy, what time do you have to start drinking to get pulled over at 8 for a DUI? Huh?”

He was quiet.

“You know you lost your license, right? How do you plan on getting to work?”

When they reached Roy and Pam’s old house he pulled into the empty driveway.

“Keys?” Jim asked.

Roy swatted at his pants, trying to feel for the keys. He looked up at Jim.

"You don't have your keys?"

"I had them."

"Where is your spare at?"

"Pam," he said.

Jim realized that Pam was probably 30 minutes out of town by now.

Jim backed out of the driveway, screeching his tires before pulling away. When they arrived at Jim's Roy eagerly got out of the car, stumbling to the door.

"You can sleep on the couch." Jim turned the key in the lock.

"I called her tonight, but she didn't answer. She said she didn't love me anymore, but now she loves you. That's strange, isn't? I mean, I get it. You're responsible."

He stopped and recalled her telling him the same thing less than an hour ago. Jim grabbed some blankets from the hallway closet and tossed them at Roy.

"Have you seen her?"

"Roy, go to bed."

"Wait, wait, wait," he sputtered. "Jimmy did you have a girl here tonight!" Roy eyed Jim's bed from the hallway. "Was it that cheerleader you brought to the game? No? It was Pam, wasn't it?"

"Roy, go to sleep."

"Nah, come on, Jimmy! Let’s share."

After a few minutes of him wandering around the living room he decided to lie down.

"Don't tell Mom," Roy mumbled in the dark. "Okay?"

Jim made no promises.

---

It was early, considering that he didn't get much sleep last night, but when he left his room, Roy was still sleeping. That guy was going on 12 hours of sleep.

In the kitchen he filled a cup of water for him and grabbed two Advil. After that night he had Jim wasn’t sure it was possible not to have a hangover.

"Wake up." He nudged him with his knee. Roy stirred.

"Ugh," Roy groaned.

"How are you feeling today?"

"Like shit." He reached for the cup in front of him.

"Yeah."

"Sorry about last night.”

Jim nodded. "I'm going to clean up, maybe you should have some breakfast and then we have to talk about some stuff."

"Are you going to tell me that you stole my best friend now?"

"I deserve that." Jim sat on the adjacent chair.

"You could have had any girl, Jim. Why did you pick the one girl that I was in love with?"

Jim laughed to himself.

"I'm serious."

"I used to think that every day," Jim laughed again. "When she told me you asked her out in high school I thought ‘he could have any girl, why did he have to pick the one I'm in love with?’"

"That's not what I was trying to do. I just figured you didn't like her. A girl like that and you never made a move."

"I was afraid."

"I didn't ask her out to prove a point to you. I was jealous of you. I didn’t have anyone in my life like that."

"She's some girl, huh?"

"Yep." Roy put the two pills in his mouth and drank them down.

"Why did you call me? Why didn't you call Mom and Dad or Tom?"

"Well, like I said, I tried Pam first. And the officer kept asking me for another number when she didn’t answer and I said yours. It was that or spending the night in the drunk tank."

"I didn’t think you would want to see me."

"I don't," he said honestly. "I'm so fucking mad at you still. But I thought Mom would have had a heart attack and Dad would have kicked my ass, but you hit like a girl."

"Thanks," Jim said.

"I don't hate you or her. I did on Wednesday and most of Thursday, and then last night I remembered all the shitty things I did while we were dating. I stood her up so many times.” He shook his head at himself. “It shouldn’t have been a surprise. Why wouldn’t she fall in love with my little brother?” Roy looked Jim square in the face for the first time since he punched him. “I’m not ready to forgive you, I’m not sure I ever will be, but I don’t hate you.”

“Don’t do stuff like last night again.”

Roy tilted his head to the side, but he never responded.

Roy eventually turned on the TV and they watched part of the 3rd round of the U.S. Open even though Roy never cared much for golf. He would grimace every now and then from his headache, and Jim would glance at him to make sure he was okay. That sat quietly for awhile and pretended like they weren’t in love with the same woman. They were brothers again for an hour.

“Mickelson is looking pretty good out there,” Roy said.

“Nope, won’t be him this year.”

The apartment was dark and he hoped that maybe she wouldn’t be home. There would be no awkwardness with him showing up unannounced. They wouldn’t have to talk about the last time they saw each other. He wouldn’t have to think about her lying in his bed, partially undressed. They wouldn’t have to think about where it would have inevitably led to.

He looked up at her window one more time before getting out of the car and walking to the door. His finger ran up and down the list of names until he found P. Beesly 3F. The seconds between ringing up to her apartment and hearing her voice come over the speaker seemed like an eternity.

“Hello?”

“Hey. Hi. It’s Jim. Can I come up?”

She didn’t say anything, but he was greeted by the loud click of the door being unlocked. He carefully navigated his way through the lobby to the stairs. There was really no turning back now, nerves be damned. She had left the door cracked for him but he still knocked as he opened it.

“Pam?” He asked before shutting the door. She seemed to appear out of nowhere, smiling. “I should have called.”

“I was actually getting ready to call you but I wasn’t sure if you would want to come over because of last time with the... I love you. I’m sure you want to talk about it again now that we're face to face. You've probably changed your mind since we last talked. Thought about it again and how it will change everything? We can’t go back.” She coughed and looked at her tangled fingers when he didn’t laugh. “Do you want the tour?”

“Is there much more to this?” He asked with a smirk as he gestured in a circle with his hand.

“You are totally underestimating my apartment, and that hurts.”

“Alright, Beesly. Wow me!”

“Okay, but you really need to start it with an open mind. Forget everything you know about square footage and embrace close quarters.”

“Forgotten.”

“Great. Now, prepare to be wowed by my huge kitchen!”

“You just said forget everything I know about space and now you want me to be in awe of it? This is a very confusing tour.”

She rolled her eyes at him before pulling him into her kitchen by his hand. She held on tight and he squeezed back.

“Oh, before I forget. House warming gifts.” He offered her a plastic bag he had been holding.

Pam peered down into the bag. “House warming gifts or snacks?”

“Both. There are non-edible things in there like a candle.”

She smiled.

“So, when can I see the bedroom?” The second those words left his mouth he regretted them. It made it seem like this visit was about one thing.

“Oh, yeah. Just give me a second.”

“That messy in there?”

“I’m unpacking!”

“You’re just messy.”

“Fine. Come in, but I warned you.”

She opened the door wider and waved him in. He took notice of the minimal amount of mess in the bedroom.

“This place is a pigsty.”

“Thank you, Jim. That’s really encouraging.”

“It’s not bad at all.” He picked up a sweat shirt that was laying over one of her lamps and grinned at her.

“So what did you want to do?” She nervously eyed the bed. “I rented a movie.”

“Yeah, I mean, if you want to watch it. If not I’ll be more than happy to watch you unpack.”

“Watch me? I forgot how helpful you are.”

“Movie it is,” he said with a grin.

They went back to the living room and Jim scooted a pile of clothes over on the couch and sat next to them.

“You can put those on the floor,” she said without looking back at him as she tried to get the DVD started.

He wasn’t sure if it was the lack of clothing she had on or her newly single status, but every move she was making seemed to be more seductive than before. He was pretty sure she was sauntering back over to him, but then again, it was probably just his imagination.

“I’ve never seen this movie,” she said.

He continued to stare at her and she nervously looked down, afraid that she was exposing more skin than she should be. She tugged at her shirt until he looked up at her.

“That’s my shirt,” he said.

“No,” she said.

“Yes, I let you borrow that shirt. Now who’s the clothes thief?”

“It’s mine now.” She laughed. “I’ve never stolen anything in my life, minus some Post-Its from work.”

“That’s okay, you can have it. What do you have there?” He asked, taking the DVD case out of her hand. He looked at the title several times. “You want to watch this?” He asked in disbelief.

“Yeah, why?”

“You’re not going to like this. In fact, I’m going to call it right now that you’re going to hate it. Did you really pick this out yourself, or did someone at the video store pick it for you.”

“I picked it out!” She snatched the case back from him.

Jim sat on the couch, watching her every move. She skipped into the kitchen and smiling at him while she gathered a few things while the previews played.

“Finding what you need in there?”

She smiled again.

“I’ve missed this,” Pam said, holding a pile of things in her hands.

“There’s candy bars in the bag I brought.”

“Got ‘em.” She set down two drinks in front of them.

“How’s the moving going?”

“Not bad, I have a lot less than I thought I did.” She turned off most of the lights in the room except for a single lamp in the corner.

“That’s good.”

She was well aware of the space between them when she sat down and her urge to close that gap right away. She had resolved to take this slow because it was what she felt like what was right, but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t willing to push the boundaries a bit.

She kicked off her shoes before sliding her legs across the space and onto his lap. But somewhere in between him placing his hand on top of her shin and the first scene with blood being vomited across the screen she lost track of her goal. She let out a confused groan into her cup.

“Something wrong?”

“No.”

“Still okay with watching this?”

“Yeah, ummm… I just thought…”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“I can turn it off right now.”

“No, don’t.”

He chuckled at her as she began to wrap her arms around herself. Her eyes doubled in size as blood covered much of the setting on the screen and she jumped when a zombie came out of nowhere.

“I’m turning it off.”

“No!” She grabbed his arm to keep him from moving.

“You’re not even enjoying the movie.”

“I am. It’s really…” She took a handful of his shirt in her hand and buried her face into this shoulder, “interesting,” she said into his shirt.

“You’re ridiculous.” He looked over at her, on his shoulder, biting her lip.

He shifted on the couch so he could face her and she finally broke her gaze with the TV.

“We should-“ He cut her off with a shake of his head.

His lips softly touched hers at first, like he was testing the waters, but soon he was nipping at her bottom lip and running his hand up and down her leg.

She still couldn’t get over how right it felt to kiss him, and how easy it all was.

Jim grabbed her leg, pressing his thumb into the inside of her thigh and slowly lowered her back. He tried to keep his mind focused on one thing at a time, but the warmth of the inside of her thigh and the little moans she was letting out were all competing for his attention at once.

“Jim, the TV.”

He didn’t even bother to look at the TV, just reached for the remote controller and hit the mute button.

“Better?” He asked already into the crook of her neck.

She laughed instead of answering.

He eventually settled on top of her, and his hands became more and more adventurous as they slid beneath things and unbuttoned anything they could.

She had never seen him be so sure of anything when he started to take off her bra. He breathed in deeply when it was finally off. He bent his head down and again nipped at her skin before jumping in fully. His breath was hot against her skin, and goose bumps quickly spread across her stomach.

She felt like they had been making out for hours when she decided that this was going to be it. She pushed at her shorts and underwear that he had just taken his hand out of a few seconds before.

“You need to catch up,” she breathed nervously.

He remained quiet as he pulled his shirt over his head.

“Maybe we should move to the bed,” she felt like words were just tumbling out of her mouth, trying to get him to answer her.

He shook his head no as he continued ahead with his roaming hands until a finger slowly dipped into her and his thumb began to make small circles against her. Her hips began to rise off the couch.

He let out groan when her leg rubbed up against his crotch, but he continued until she was squirming beneath him.

“Jim,” she said when his hand slipped away from her and he started to kiss his way down her torso. “Say something,” she squeaked when she felt him pressing against her through his pants again.

“I’m never going to get used to seeing you naked,” he said.

“Okay?” She said almost uncomfortably.

“We can stop if you want.”

“Just nerves. A lot of nerves,” she emphasized.

“Anything I can do to help?”

“Be as naked as I am,” she answered meekly.

“If that’s your only request you are easier than I thought.” He pushed back up and undressed as she watched. “Alright, kind of feeling the nerves now.”

He lay back down on the couch and a smile spread across her face. “I’m never going to get used to seeing you naked either.” She smacked his butt.

This moment was more than surreal. She was naked beneath him on his couch laughing and smiling up at him.

“I don’t think we’re going to be able to have sex on this couch.”

“Oh ye of little faith.” He grabbed her left leg and bent it around the back of his leg.

“How many times have you done this?”

“On this couch? Never. But I’ve wanted to have sex with you on a couch since we were 15 so I’ve had a lot of time to think about it and practice it in my head.”

“15? I’m pretty sure I was still playing with Barbies at 15.”

“You weren’t, trust me.”

“What else have you wanted to do since you were 15?”

“We’ll get to that, it’s only 9. I was kind of a perv if you remember.”

He positioned himself and pushed into her as he finished his sentence and she breathed in deeply and moaned out his name.

“Pam,” he moaned back to the right person for the first time in his life.

She tried to hold on to every noise and grunt he made, and she took note of the way he still hand one had exploring her body while the other helped him balance himself over her.

“Harder,” she gasped when she was nearly there. She was almost as surprised as he was when she said.

He breathed out hard through his nose. Thinking that if he kept his jaw clenched he wouldn’t let out the groan he was holding on to and he wouldn’t break under pressure.

“Please, Jim, harder,” she begged as her nails began to lightly press into his shoulders.

He reached back for her leg that was tightly wrapped around his legs and pushed it closer to her body. He slammed into her with greater force, and she matched that force with a slack jaw and a series of reverberating sounds that seemed to slip into his mouth.

“Floor,” he said suddenly when he realized that the couch wasn’t doing him any favors.

“Now?” She said between her quick breaths.

He planted a hand on the floor below him and let himself fall to the ground. She looked down at him, chest heaving, trying to blow out steady breaths before joining him on the floor.

“I’m not… I don’t really like being on top,” she said from the couch.

He licked his lips and slowly helped her slide off the couch. She looked so uncomfortable straddling his waist. One arm covered her breast and the she used the other to keep herself right above Jim’s stomach.

“You are so beautiful.”

He placed his hand on the side of her face and she leaned down until their lips met. He took advantage of this moment to move her arm off her chest. And she readily complied. His hands immediately went to her exposed breast and she moaned.

“Okay,” she said as she slide back to find him.

“Yeah?” He asked.

She nodded with her eyes closed tight until she slid down on him.

Her breathing quickly returned to the heavy uneven one from before as she started to move. She kept her eyes on the ceiling for the first minute. She had never been this daring before, especially not during sex. She eventually brought her eyes down to his when his hands left her hips and they reached up to move her hair out of her face.

And god, he was looking at her, like really looking at her. She closed her eyes again, fearing it would become too much.

“Come here,” he struggled to say.

She leaned back down but tried to keep her rhythm going. His kisses were erratic now, often missing their mark, but they were sweet. Because while most guys would have given up trying Jim was still at, trying to show her how much he loved her and needed her.

She grabbed his chin to steady him, and she smiled against his mouth before kissing him again.

“Pam,” he moaned.

“Are you…?”

He nodded and she jumped slightly when his hand slipped between them. And now it was her that had become erratic. Any rhythm that she had was now gone, but Jim eagerly picked up the slack and his hand guided her hips back and forth. His fingers found their spot and her back slowly curved towards him.

“Umm…”She tried to say something. Her breath was heavy against his neck. “Yes,” she finally said. “Don’t stop,” she said in a high pitched voice. “Right there.”

He didn’t and before she knew it she could feel the warmth spreading from him inside of her up into her stomach. She finished on top of him, kissing his neck, slowly still rocking her hips against his. She tried to compose herself quickly for him, but it was proving harder to gain her bearings again.

Without notice he rolled them both over so he was now on top and all she could manage was wrapping her legs around and hoping that helped. With this new position she continued to spasm around him. And she thought for a split second it might be possible to die from this orgasm. A few minutes later he too seemed lose his rhythm and his face began to twist and his pace picked up. He was so hard inside of her that he knew any second it would be over. He moaned her name again and again before spilling into her. He ended with one final grunt that shook her body. He stayed inside of her while her body continued to tighten around him. A large smile spread across his face and she lazily smiled back up at him.

“That was amazing,” she whispered.

“I think we can do better,” he joked. He wiped some sweat from her forehead and then his own.

She lifted her knee up and pointed at it for him to see. “I’ve got rug burn on my knees,” she laughed.

“Wait till you see my back.” She lifted her head to examine it.

“I told you we should have gone to the bed.”

“Next time,” he said. “Soon.”

“I’m so in love with you,” she said.

Normally she would have been reaching for a blanket or anything to cover up with, but he made her feel oddly confident. They stayed on the carpet amongst some boxes and a pile of clothes that Jim had shoved onto the floor earlier. Her eyes drifted around the room and she laughed. “I thought Sandra Bullock was in this movie,” she said out of the blue.

Jim looked up in time just to see the movie ending. He laughed. “God, I love you so much.” He kissed her again.

Her sheets were tangled from them, and she pulled it slightly to make it more comfortable. Jim was lying next to her. He had struggled after their last time to stay awake. Their trivial conversation about which was better: dinosaurs or aliens, had gone unanswered. She kissed him lightly on lips and let him sleep.

She was smaller, more afraid of things but strangely more confident in herself. She crept around the house, holding her skinny friend’s hand. Her hand was starting to sweat, but she knew if she let go she’d be captured.

He looked down at her feet that held her wobbling legs in place and he thought they should go the other way. He tugged at her hand a little, trying not to make any noise.

“No,” she argued.

His finger went up to her mouth to shush her.

She pulled his arm this time hard in the direction that she wanted to go.

She had been tracing a line on his hand thinking about how tightly he used to hold her hand as children when his finger threaded through hers and closed around her hand.

“Morning,” he said sleepily.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” she said. “You looked so cute sleeping.”

He smiled with half open eyes and she let her thumb run over his thumb.

“I’ve always been fascinated by your hands.” His eyes grew wider. “God, not like that. I just remember holding them when I was little and then not so much when we were older.”

“Big mistake on our part.” His fingers gently pressed into the back of her hand.

“Do you think if we would have started dating when we were younger we wouldn’t have lasted?”

“I could never see myself breaking up with you.”

She held her breath because his words confirmed what she had thought from the first time he told her that he loved her. This was it for them.

---

She didn’t like to think that she completely turned her back on Roy, but she kind of did. It was a conscious choice. It wasn’t that she feared that he’d be able to somehow pull her back in, she just wasn’t sure how or if they could transition into being friends especially after leaving him and then going for Jim. They were never really friends to begin with, not even while dating.

She saw him lazily throwing a bell pepper into his basket and he looked incredibly lost. She tried not to stare but as soon as he turned around he was saw her.

“Hey,” he said. His tone gave nothing away.

He chased them both through the yard. If they had been smarter or older they would have split up, they wouldn’t have continued holding on to each other like being together would somehow save the other.

He cornered them at the edge of yard just by the fence.

She closed her eyes and her little lips moved with her not so silent prayer that he wouldn’t throw dirt in her hair.

“Please,not my hair. We’re so sorry. We didn’t mean to. We just wanted to brush his teeth. We’ll buy you a new doll.”

She looked over nervously at the little boy standing next to her. “Go,” she mouthed as Roy approached. She prayed Jim would just let go of her hand and make a run for it.

“He’s a GI Joe,” Roy corrected.

“Hi,” she said. Her legs were crossed and she felt like she was 8 all over again hoping he wouldn’t throw dirt in her hair. “What are you going to make with that?” She pointed to the bell pepper.

“Salad?” He answered looking at the vegetable.

“Umm… yeah you can put that in a salad.”

“Honestly, I was probably just going to buy it and never use it.” He quickly put it back on the pile behind him.

“Get it,” she urged. “Stuffed bell peppers. You love stuffed bell peppers.”

He nodded but didn’t pick it back up.

He still hadn’t made any eye contact with her since first seeing her. She didn’t blame him though. She was dating his brother and he had to be a witness to it all.

“How are you?” She finally asked when he made no move to leave.

“Really?” He responded with a slight chuckle.

“Yeah.”

“Well, you heard about the DUI.” She followed him through the produce section as he picked up a tomato. “Let me just say that they’re really expensive.” She stayed quiet as he continued to talk. “And no driver’s license which means no car to get around in, so that sucks. So I walk a lot. Like a lot. I’ve lost some weight though. So I guess it’s not all bad.”

They paused in front of the lettuce and she grabbed a head of lettuce.

“How are you and Jim?” She was surprised that there was no contempt behind his voice.

“We’re okay. Taking things slow,” she lied.

She was vaguely aware how this might seem callous to others, but ignoring him when they stood more than a few feet apart seemed more callous.

“You guys were always great together,” he responded earnestly. His hand toyed with the price tag for the tomatoes. “I still miss you,” he said.

She didn’t know if she should apologize or remind him of her faults in attempt to make him not miss her. So she did nothing. She thought that this was a mistake and that she should have walked away, but it was bound to happen sooner or later.

“Do you want a ride home?” It was the coward’s way out of his comment.

“No. I could use the extra exercise.” He patted his gut.

She turned to leave him alone with his shopping but the need to make this better for him was overwhelming even though she knew nothing would make this better except time. “One day you will meet someone and she will be…”

“Not you,” he finished.

“She’ll be perfect. She’ll be your best friend.”

She didn’t know if those were the right things to say or if she had any right at all to say them, but the corner of his mouth pulled into half a smile, and she hoped that maybe it helped.

---

When she arrived back at her place she was unquestionably sad. She had been thinking about how arbitrary a month was, even more so because they weren’t even able to make it past two weeks. Jim walked into her house not too soon after. He was freshly showered after last night. She was expecting him.

“What’s wrong?” He asked as soon as he closed the door.

“I saw Roy.”

“Did you guys fight?”

She shook her head no. “Do you think we did this too fast?”

“Do you?”

“No.” But it made her wonder how everyone else felt about them. “Do your parents hate me?”

“What?”

“I’d hate me if I were them.”

“What? No. God, Pam. They love you.”

“Still?”

“I’ll admit that this is a weird situation, but they’re okay with us.”

“Is it weird that I’m afraid to run into her? I keep thinking that I’ll run into your mom and she’ll give me dirty looks especially after today.”

“I think she’s just happy that we’ve all figured out what was right for us. My mom asked me how you were doing with all this a few days ago. She doesn’t hate you. And I love that you care, but we can’t stop living our lives for everyone else. I’ve done it, it’s not worth it.” Even though he believed everything he had just said, he knew it wasn’t worth it, he couldn’t help but to notice that a small part of him felt the same way that she did. Very small. That if they could have hid this for longer or pretended to be friends that Roy would be in less pain. But that small part of him was the Jim of yesteryear. That was the Jim that pushed Roy and Pam together to save Pam heartbreak and to help Roy save face.

She looked at him with unsure eyes.

He wanted to tell her that there is nothing they could do about it now, but he didn’t. He instead took her into a hug and kissed her temple.

“We should go somewhere tonight. Go somewhere that will be just us. Where we can be a couple without worrying about anyone else.”

She hugged him tighter. “Does a place like that really exist?” She joked.

“I think it’s near Oz. Sadly though, because of my work schedule and your work schedule we’ll have to keep it in the land of America.”

“Wilkes-Barre Holiday Inn?”

“I think we can do better than that. I’ll be right back. You pack, and I’ll meet you back here in an hour.”

“You can do better than the Holiday Inn in an hour?” She looked up at him.

“I have no idea,” he cringed.

“We can stay here. Really, I like being here in my apartment, with you, just you.” She continued her hug.

“We need this,” he said. “It’ll be fun. Romantic.”

He stood behind her, shaking his hands through her hair trying to remove all the dirt from her curls.

“They’re ruined,” she cried.

“Still looks pretty,” he said.

“No.”

“I think it looks pretty. Like fun.”

“Fun?” she asked.

“Like an afro,” he said confidently.

She frowned.

There was no doubt that he had perfected making her feel better since then.

---

He helped her with her overnight bag down the stairs. She was excited and bouncing behind him.

“Are you sure I don’t need my swimsuit?” She asked again.

“No.”

“So are you saying there will be no beach?”

“No beach, but good idea.”

“No hot tub?”

“Well…”

“Great!” Because I packed it!”

She held the door open for him when they reached the lobby entrance.

“So where are we going?” She asked eagerly.

“It’s a surprise.”

“Philly?”

“No.”

“It’s Wilkes-Barre, isn’t it?”

“Completely wrong direction. Think more east.”

“New York?” she questioned.

“Maybe.” He grinned back at her.

“Really?” She jumped. “That’s too much, Jim.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right. Let’s just stay here.” He turned on his heel away from his car, but she paid him no attention and got into his car.

He held his hands up waiting for her to get out. Her head motioned for him to get in.

“You’re more stubborn than I remember,” he teased he said from the backdoor as he put her bag on the floor.

“Hurry. What if there’s traffic?”

“I guess we won’t make our reservations then.”

“Reservations?”

She smiled widely as he drove away. She would have been content with just him in the apartment upstairs.

“Do you remember when we brushed Roy’s GI Joe’s teeth with Comet and it ate away at some of the face?”

“Yeah,” Jim laughed. “I was scared shitless.”

“Why didn’t you run?”

“Without you?” He asked as he checked his mirror to merge onto the highway.

“Yeah.”

“Never crossed my mind to.”

The small girl held onto her best friend’s hand and they went right around the house instead of left. And they were caught. But he never showed any fear. He had stayed firmly at her side.

It was barely late afternoon, and truth be told she was starving. They hadn’t eaten anything since last night and every gas station they passed was like a kick in the stomach. Her stomach growled and she clutched it, hoping that the sound was just in her head. But they were just gotten into the city and she could wait.

“Whoa,” he said.

“You heard that?”

“Yeah. That was like a mini earthquake.”

“Why aren’t you hungry?”

“I ate before I went to get you.”

“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”

“We’re almost there.”

She impatiently tapped her fingers against her stomach as a distraction.

They parked in a lot near the hotel and he walked around the car to her side to open the door for her, and she checked her makeup in the mirror on the visor before he made it around. With a swift wipe from her finger under her eyes she stopped the beginnings of raccoon eyes. She privately chided herself for being so self-conscious.

Outside she noticed him breathe into his hand. It was funny that after countless years as her best friend that checking his breathe would be a concern and that she would be checking her makeup.

“Your makeup looks great.” He laughed at his comment. It was such an awkward first date thing to say.

“I don’t know why we’re acting like this is our first date,” she said when he reached for her hand to help her out of the car.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

“I saw you naked last night.”

“I saw you do stuff I had only imagined in some of my dirtiest dreams,” he whispered in her ear in front of the hotel clerk.

She tugged on his arm when the man gave them an odd look.

Jim cleared his voice. “Reservation for Halpert.”

Both Jim and Pam quickly took notice that the man didn’t look them up in the computer that sat on the desk. Instead he opened a large brown book and his finger ran up and down the page until coming to Jim’s reservation.

“James Halpert, double occupancy room, one night, check out 12pm, Sunday. Here is your room key, complimentary map of the floor, and bathroom key.”

“Bathroom key?” Pam asked with an edge of nervousness.

The man opened the map for the floor layout. “Floors 2-6 have the same layout.” He pointed to the top layout on the map. “Your room, here, bathroom, here.”

She looked up at Jim. “Jim?”

“There’s no bathroom in the room,” Jim said out loud after several times of repeating it in his head. “There is no bathroom in the room.”

Pam sucked in air through her lips which made a loud popping noise. “Yep.”

“This is going to be great,” he told himself more than he was telling her.

“Interesting is maybe the word you were looking for,” Pam chimed in.

“Dwight, is it?” Jim said as he tapped the man’s name tag and then straightened the tag for him. “On the website I booked this on it clearly stated that the ‘spacious rooms’ had bathroom facilities. Which I found to be bizarre that those words were even included. But they were included.”

“Jim, is it?” Dwight responded. “The Hotel Hansel was opened in 1902. Some would say that you’re lucky that there are bathrooms on the premises at all. And they are included on every floor.”

“And did the website not also say that there was a pool?”

“Yes, in 1915 there was pool added to our sister hotel in Flushing.”

“Let’s just go, Jim. Room 418.” She checked the papers in front of them. “It’s just one night.” She started to walk away hoping that he would follow her.

“I’m leaving a bad review when we get back home.” He said when they were out of earshot.

She laughed at him. “It’s a nice place. Who cares if we have to share a bathroom? Plus this place doesn’t exactly look booked up.”

“There’s a key to the bathroom though.”

“And to our room. I feel very… secure.”

“But you should have seen some of the reviews for this place.” She pressed the button for the elevator. “This was supposed to be romantic.”

“And it will be, once we get food.”

They stepped into the creaky elevator.

“I knew you were blinded by something else back there.”

“Please, Jim. I just need a hot dog or something, anything.”

They stepped off the elevator and they turned the corner, following the sign for the room numbers.

“Do these doors look oddly close together?” Jim asked.

“Maybe they’re really long rooms,” she suggested.

He unlocked the door and closed both eyes, afraid of what he would see.

“Hmm…” Pam said.

Jim opened his eyes. Two very small twin beds took up the majority of the space in the room.

“You’ve got to be kidding.”

Pam went up to one of the beds and pressed her knee into the mattress. “They’re soft.” She spun around in place looking at the other contents of the room. “Oh look, Jim. They have Wi-Fi!” She pointed to the sign on the desk that was smashed up in the corner of the room against one of the beds.

“Imagine that. I didn’t realize that Wi-Fi was available in 1902.”

“This place is really… homey,” She enthused.

“I am so sorry. Bad review, I promise.”

Pam fell back on one of the twin beds and clutched her stomach once more. “Lunch, Jim,” she said with a slight pout on her face.

“Okay, okay.”

“Yes!” She said with a fist in the air. “Do you think they have room service here?” She smiled.

---

They walked hand in hand down the street. She took a giant bite from her hot dog and then offered him a bite. There was a point earlier when she felt like they should be awkward, it being the first date and all. But she knew Jim better than she knew anyone else. And the awkwardness never came. They rarely missed a beat.

“Good first real date,” she said with half a full mouth.

“Top five easily,” he said.

“I don’t know how we’ll ever be able to top that hotel though.”

“Shut up,” he laughed. “You jinxed me with the Holiday Inn thing.”

“Yes, that was all me. Maybe next time around I’ll get a boyfriend that carefully reads online hotel descriptions.”

“Hey! No need for threats, Beesly. I’ve learned my lesson. Just for that I’m taking the twin next to the window.”

“Can’t. I put my stuff on that one. I called it.”

He lifted their joined hands and kissed her knuckles.

“Hurry and finish that hot dog, we have places to go.”

“Where?” She said with another full mouth.

“The Whitney. They close in a few hours so…”

He reached for the hot dog and took a big bite out of it to help her along. She managed to eat the rest of her food by the time they hit the next crosswalk.

“I’ve actually never been there.”

“I know.”

“You are perfect. How do you remember all of these things?”

“I keep an extensive notebook on all things related to Pam Beesly.”

She stood in the small space between them and pushed up on her tip toes to kiss him. They held the kiss a little too long and people begin to push around them when the light changed. “We’ve never been able to do that before in public.”She looked at the people around them and her face felt flushed with fever. “Did that taste like hot dog?”

“Kind of. Should we do it again just to make sure?” He raised an eyebrow at her.

“I am really sorry,” she said while her thumb wiped the small amount of mustard left on his mouth.

---

In the cab ride back from the museum she leaned into him. Her shoulder fit perfectly under his arm.

“I had fun today.”

“Me too.”

“I kind of don’t want to go back tomorrow.”

“Nights not over. We still have dinner.”

When the cab arrived at the hotel she got out first and waited until the cab driver was long gone before setting her plan in motion.

“You know Jim, I feel like there’s so much I don’t know about you.”

“Oh yeah,” he played along, “like what?” He held the door for her.

“What’s your favorite position?” She whispered to him.

His face turned bright red.

“Won’t answer that,” he said stifling a laugh.

“Come on!”

His eyes looked at the same desk clerk as they sped by.

“What’s yours?” He challenged.

She leaned over and whispered in his ear and his mouth dropped.

“No…” he muttered.

“No, but I had you there for a second.”

His hand gripped her waist.

“We’re going to miss our reservations,” he said when he saw that flash of mischief in her eyes.

“God, I hope so.”

She pulled him through the hotel lobby and back up that same elevator. She fumbled with the key at their door as his lips pressed into the side of her neck. Their legs moved together once inside and they stopped at the first bed.

“Those fucking beds,” he growled.

Jim walked in between them and picked the night stand up without a second thought. Pam waited for him to move out from between before starting to push them together.

He returned to her, gently lifting her chin to meet his lips. He was slower with her this time. Every kiss and placing of his hands seemed to be well thought out. She suddenly questioned whether or not this was her plan or his.

In this almost too small hotel room they slowly made love. After they squeezed onto one side of their makeshift queen sized bed. Her body conformed to his body’s position.

“I know you were joking earlier about the room service, but you do you think they really have it?”

“I’d be afraid of what they would bring up. Like a live chicken for us to pluck. I don’t think I could handle all that fun.”

“I’m dying to see these communal bathrooms.”

“We should come back here, in a year,” she suggested afraid it would be falling on deaf ears.

“Here?”

“Yeah, I kind of like this place.” She turned her head to the side just to catch a small part of his lips between hers.

---

Jim sat at his computer pondering the exact words to describe their stay at the Hotel Hansel. Fingers tapped against the keys lightly enough not to actually type anything out. He remembered Pam squeezed in tightly next to him and her jokes about the random portrait on the wall.

Our stay at the Hotel Hansel was quite breathtaking. It was like taking a step back in time. The rooms leave little to be desired. I’ve never slept on a more comfortable bed. The staff was extremely helpful and quite knowledgeable about the hotel. We will definitely come back.

“What did you write?” Pam asked him from the phone pressed against his shoulder and his face.

“I really let them have it.”

It was October and things had been going really well with them. Remarkably so. She often questioned if this was real. Like maybe she was dreaming and she’d wake up and it would be her wedding to Roy tomorrow. But she was determined to go with it, even if it was a dream.

“What do you want for your birthday?” She asked as they walked up his parents' driveway.

“Surprise me.”

“I mean, I have something for you, but yesterday you said there was something specific you wanted.” She pinched his side and he squirmed. “Tell me.” She started her torture.

“We’re going to be late and then my parents will think we’re late because we were having sex,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Well just tell me and then your parents won’t know that you’re a sex crazed fiend.”

“You really want to know?”

She bobbed her head.

“Will you move in with me?” He smiled at her. He had been thinking about it a lot in the past week or so. “That’s all I want.”

But she didn’t smile back and she didn’t say yes. Her lack of expression was troubling.

“Umm…” she started.

“You don’t?”

“I think maybe we should talk about it later.”

“But you don’t?”

“Let’s talk about it later.”

He sighed loudly. “Fine, later.”

All these thoughts ran through his head like maybe he was moving too fast or maybe she was ready to take a step back. She looked sad and apologetic. He didn’t want her to pity him. He wanted her to agree with him. He was ready to move onto next step. They had spent so much time apart, living separate lives, and he didn’t want to waste anymore. He was ready.

He felt her hand slowly slip into his. “I am so in love with you.”

“I know.”

“Be happy then. It’s your birthday!”

“Yeah.” He nodded solemnly.

She opened the front door and they were greeted immediately. She felt terrible because on this day that was supposed to be fun and happy he was sucked dry of any joy. Pam looked around the room at the people. Tom was sitting with his kids in front of the television, and his wife bounced their newest addition gently to the sound of her humming, but Jim just stood silently next to her like she had reached inside of him and torn out his heart. She had to admit that she had bad timing, but she thought he was going to ask for a new iPod or something smaller.

“Happy Birthday,” several people said in unison.

He smiled meekly back at them all. His mom wasted no time hugging him and then Pam.

“Let me take your coats,” his dad offered.

“I’m going to go see the baby,” she said to him. She released his hand and looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to say something, but instead he helped her with her coat and stayed in the entrance. His mother followed Pam to the baby.

“What’s wrong?” His dad asked.

“Nothing.” He shook his head almost as if he was trying to shake the funk he was in.

He clutched her coat as Pam’s face lit up when his sister-in-law handed her the baby. He watched her every move, the way she began to nervously smile when the baby moved slightly in her arms, and the way she tried to give the baby back when he did eventually wake up.

“Please, Rachel, take him.” She nervously laughed. “Betsy?” She asked his mom.

His sister-in-law waved it off; she looked relieved to be able to sit for a moment without the baby.

“You’re doing great,” his mom told Pam. “Just rock him. He’ll be fine. You’ll both be fine.”

Pam pleadingly looked over at Jim. He instead gave her a thumbs up.

He felt his dad’s hand grab his shoulder and he knew that he was such a bad liar.

“Kitchen?” His dad asked.

“I should probably say hi to everyone first.” Jim weaseled his way out of his dad’s grip. “But later,” he vaguely promised.

He stopped at his niece and nephew. They paid him little attention at first. He, despite what Pam thought of him, was not more interesting than cartoons. He nudged his way on to the couch with little effort.

“What are you guys watching here?” He pointed to the movie playing.

“Cars,” they said in unison.

“I have a car, you know.”

“Not the same,” Roy said from the doorway.

It was bizarre to hear that voice. Jim looked up at his brother, who he hadn’t seen much of in the last few months. He was surprised that he came, especially on today of all days.

“Uncle Roy has no idea what he’s talking about. Ask your dad, he knows.”

The kids looked over at their dad.

“Uncle Jim does have a car,” Tom said.

“But does it talk?” The small boy asked hopefully.

“No. No matter how hard I try I just can’t get it to talk. But if you guys figure it out let me know. He’s shy.”

“Hey, guys. Give him his card.” Tom told his children.

“Happy birthday,” Vanessa said shyly.

“Is that today?” Jim asked. His nephew held out a yellow colored envelope. “Is this for me?” The boy nodded. “Did you pick this out?”

“Phillip did,” Vanessa answered for her brother.

His name was scribbled on the front and the card inside was mostly illegible but their names. “Thank you! Come here,” he hugged them both at the same time. “And $5 too. Wow. This is just… too much. You guys shouldn’t have.”

“I told them the same thing,” Tom said with a laugh.

“Thanks,” he told Tom. “That’s really nice of you.”

The room quickly went silent except for the television when Jim got up. Roy was still standing in the same place, like maybe he was just popping his head in to say hi.

“Thanks for coming today,” Jim said to Roy.

“Yeah, I hadn’t seen the baby yet, and it’s your birthday.”

They didn’t hug or shake or even stand very close to each other, but they did both look at Pam who had managed to calm the crying baby again.

“She was never good with kids,” Roy said.

Jim shrugged. “I think she just thinks she’s not good with kids.”

“I can hear you both,” Pam said in a low whisper despite the fact that everyone else was speaking at a normal volume.

“So how have you been?” Jim asked.

“Not bad.”

“What about you guys?”

“Good,” Jim said simply.

“Good.”

“How’s work?”

“Good. It’s good.”

“You?”

“Good,” Jim responded. “Like the beard.”

“Yeah, felt like a good time for a change.” Roy’s hand moved through the scruff on his face.

“My beard doesn’t grow as nice as that.”

“You had a beard?”

“Yeah, for a week in college.”

“Hmm…”

Roy looked up at the ceilings several times; Jim assumed it was to keep from looking at him.

“Well, thanks for coming today. It means a lot.”

“We’re brothers,” Roy shrugged. And without warning he punched him in the shoulder hard. “That’s one,” Roy pointed at him as he began to walk away. “You’ve got twenty-eight more of those before you leave.”

Jim rubbed his shoulder and he inexplicably smiled because it was such a normal thing for Roy to do on his birthday.

“I’m not going to hold back either. You stole my fiancée this year, so I think it’s only fair.”

His face fell again, he wasn’t sure if he should be happy that Roy was, well being very Roy, or if he should be taken aback that Roy somehow equated a birthday beating as punishment for stopping his wedding.

“Okay,” he said slightly confused.

“Twenty-nine from me still,” Tom yelled.

“Jesus,” he murmured.

“Jim,” Pam said in a harsh whisper. She beckoned him with a few fingers but never taking her whole hand away from the baby.

He peered down at the little face that was nestled in the blanket. His finger touched the baby’s exposed face. “He is cute. Definitely did not get that from Tom.”

“I’m sorry,” she said suddenly. “About before, outside.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“Do you want to hold him?”

“I think I’m okay. And he looks so comfortable right there.”

“So when are you guys going to start having some of these,” Tom questioned.

“Oh my god,” Jim sighed. “I literally have the most inappropriate brothers. I am going to go find Mom.”

“Ah it’s fine. Roy is in the garage with Dad,” Tom called after Jim as he left the room.

“He’s mad at me right now,” she confessed.

“Jim?” He questioned. “I don’t think Jim knows how to be mad at you or anyone for that matter.” Tom wrapped an arm around Pam’s shoulder.

“I hope so.” Tom finally reached for the baby and Pam let out an audible sigh. “Thank you.”

“You look happier with Jim, even when you guys are having a fake argument.” Pam nervously looked behind her. “You know, all that stuff I said about marriage before, I forgot to tell you that it’s not so bad when you’re with someone that you love.”

Sometimes the Halpert boys were almost too alike. She would seem glimmers of Jim in all of them in spite of their obnoxiousness.

“I am going to find Jim.”

When she reached the kitchen she stopped when she heard his voice, and waited just to the side of door.

“I asked her to move in with me,” Jim whispered.

“Jim,” his mother sighed.

“I know, I know. It’s too soon. I know that now after I asked.”

“You were always my hopeless romantic.”

---

The house was dark and she felt around on the wall for the light switch, but by the time she hit it he was already across the room putting his coat down on the back of a kitchen chair.

“Everyone was in rare form today.”

“It was nice,” she responded.

“Tom especially.” She could see the wheels turning in his head. He logically thought if he kept the topic on something else she would forget about him asking her to move in with him. “My arms are killing me.” He reached into the fridge for a beer. “Did you hear what Roy said?”

She nodded.

“About stealing you?”

She nodded again.

“And then the baby comment?”

“Jim…”

He stopped. “So?” He asked.

“I just don’t think we should do it yet. Yet,” she emphasized.

“Why?”

“It’s just… I’ve never lived by myself. Ever. And I think it’s been good for me. When I was with Roy I was never really sure who I was or what I really liked. I was just kind of there like a piece of furniture. I would love to live with you. We basically do live together, but…”

“I understand. Now I do. It was stupid.”

“Listen,” she started. “Your lease is up in December, which will be six months for us. Let’s do it then.”

“No, I don’t want to make you do it sooner than you want to because it will be convenient.”

“You won’t be making me do it sooner. December, I want you to move in with me in December.”

“You think you’ll feel different in two months?”

“Yes.”

“What if you don’t?”

“Then I’ll suffer quietly,” she teased.

“Come on.”

“Here’s the thing, this month, I just know it’s too soon. And I don’t want to have any regrets. I just need to make sure I can take care of myself before we do that.”

“I get it, I really do. And I shouldn’t have acted like a baby when you didn’t want to have this whole conversation in front of my parent’s house.”

“It’s your birthday, Jim.”

“Can you spend the night at least?” He smirked.

“That is so tempting but…”

“It’s my birthday, Pam.”

She pushed him back on his couch, and slowly climbed on top of him. “Obviously, I’m staying the night.”

She was curled up on their bed, chest rising and falling slowly, and her hair had fallen across her face. His first instinct was to let her sleep but he had plans for today and he sort of needed her to be awake for them. He kneeled down next to the bed until they were eye level. He took his hand and moved the hair off her face and she subconsciously leaned into his touch.

“Pam, wake up,” he said gently with a hand on her arm.

“Hmm?”

“Wake up, babe.”

“Mmm. Hi,” she whispered. She sleepily reached for him.

“Hey. How are you doing?”

“Eh.”

He stood up and sat next to her on the bed. “I was thinking we should get out of here for awhile.”

“I’m good with just sitting here. I’m pretty tired.”

“You haven’t done anything today,” he laughed.

“I know. That’s why it’s so weird. Up?” She asked with her hand out for him to help her.

“That tired, really?”

“Exhausted.”

“Well, I’ll make sure to get you to bed early tonight.”

He pulled her arm until she was sitting up. Every single inch of his skin was tingling, and any second his body threatened to jump out of its skin.

“Let’s go,” she announced with a clap and a yawn.

“You kill me.”

“Me too,” she mumbled as she wrapped her arms around his neck.

“You’re still asleep, huh?” His hands rubbed her back.

“I think so,” she stated wryly. She could feel her eyes getting heavy again, and she hugged him tighter. “Okay, let’s get up.” She swung her legs over the side and stretched. Getting up and doing stuff was the last thing she wanted to do, but she couldn’t deny him once he asked. She never really could.

“I kind of have something planned for today, if you’re up to it.” He nervously rubbed his neck.

“Yeah?” She smiled. “Okay.” And she had seen that look of nervousness before and it made her stomach flip.

“Just a picnic. It’s warmer today.”

He squeezed the gold band in his pocket to make sure it was still there, that he hadn’t dropped it.

“Picnic?” She asked suspiciously. “What’s the special occasion?”

“Well, here’s my thinking: we have lived together for two months now and you have napped through one of them, but never out in public yet, so I plan on forcing you out in public to keep you awake.”

“It’s your fault I’m tired all the time. If I would have known that letting you live here would lead to less sleep it would have never happened, mister.” She sauntered back to him. “This bed and you have been the undoing of me.”

He leaned forward, mere inches from her lips. He stopped and looked her straight in the eyes before standing straight up, making his lips a hop out of reach for her and he jogged in place. “I’ve got tons of energy.”

“Shut up.” She playfully pushed him back on the bed. “I’m going on this picnic by myself.”

“Wait, wait, come back. I promise that I’ll get you to bed early tomorrow. Promise.”

“Tonight or tomorrow? You said tonight earlier. Have something planned for tonight as well?”

“No, nothing in particular.” He felt for the ring again, less to make sure it was still there and more of an affirmation that this was going to happen and hopefully today they would become engaged.

The park was just down the block, but she leaned on him more and more with each step. The air definitely had a bite to it. He had imagined this sweet moment but her shivering was making this less sweet and slightly cruel. The sun had betrayed him this afternoon.

“Would you still love me if I kicked you out?” She asked jokingly.

“Yes,” he nodded.

“Even if I kept your kitchen table?”

“Yes. I never really liked it anyways.”

“Would you still love me if I wore pants like that?” She pointed at some old man walking his dog.

“Yes, but only if they were in that same exact brown color.”

She laughed. “You go.”

He stopped them right there on the street corner, and he put their bag of picnic food down on the sidewalk. He worried that she might actually see his heart pounding through his shirt if she hadn’t already felt it pounding since the moment they left the house.

“Okay, but be prepared. I’ve been working on this one for awhile.” His hand reached for his eyelid and forced it open more.

“Don’t,” she warned. “Don’t do it. I swear, Jim.” She covered her eyes with her hands.

“Just look.”

“No and when you get pink eye you’re sleeping on the couch.”

“Pam,” he said sincerely.

“Don’t, Jim.”

“Pam,” he repeated softly.

She pulled one hand away from her eye to see nothing in front of her and her head slowly dropped to the sidewalk where he was kneeling and holding a ring between his index finger and thumb, waiting for her.

“I have loved you for as long as I can remember.” He swallowed hard. “And I can’t imagine spending the rest of my life without you.”

Her other hand dropped to her side before clenching her coat to keep from jumping up and down and ruining this moment.

“Oh my god,” she said before he finished. “Oh my god!”

He smiled widely. “Pam, will you marry me?” He finished.

“Yes,” she said finally. She tugged at his arm until he was standing with her, and she wasted no time wrapping her arms around his neck to kiss him. “Yes,” she said again against his lips. She had never felt this happy, ever. She wanted to kiss him forever, make sure he felt as amazing as she did.

“The ring,” he said. He was still holding it as her kiss started to deepen.

She smiled at him as he pulled away. Her tongue peeked through her teeth. It was like electricity was running through her body. And his fingers slid along with her ring down the length of hers. Her arm wrapped around him again as soon as it was on her finger and she kissed him again, she didn’t care who was watching.

She felt the first flake on her cheek and she pulled away to look up at the sky and followed another snowflake until it hit Jim’s shoulder and began to melt into his collar.

“I was going to do this at the park, on a blanket, champagne in paper cups, but it’s really cold.”

She kissed his cheek. “You could have asked anywhere and I would have said yes.”

“Home?” he asked with both her hands enclosed by his.

It was absolutely the greatest feeling in the world knowing that all it took was 5 words and he had never seen her look happier. Consciously or unconsciously his thumb moved to her ring finger to make sure it was still there, that it was even there to begin with because he had definitely had this dream before.

“I love you,” she breathed.

“I love you too.”

“Should we make a run for it?”

He nodded but she was already off back towards their apartment. When she reached the front door first she waited in the lobby staring at him. She waved for him to hurry. She couldn’t wait to get back upstairs with him.

His feet slipped on the tile floor but he managed to find his footing before hitting the ground. Any other time he’d feel a tinge of embarrassment that other people saw that but nothing could bring him down. Nothing.

She smiled a toothy grin at him before making her way up the stairs.

“We should elope,” she called back to him.

He took the stairs two at a time to keep up with her. He was now convinced that she had been faking being tired, smoking him out until he proposed.

“You don’t want a real wedding?” he asked out of breath now.

“Think about it, just you and me. What about a really short engagement?” she rambled off.

She splayed her hands out in front of her when she reached the door. Her fingers wiggled waiting for him to say something.

“So you like it?” Her eyes glimmered when the ring seemed to catch the light from above.

“I love it. It’s perfect. You’re perfect.” Pam kissed his cheek and he pulled his keys out to unlock the door.

She was still shaking against him so he pulled her closer once inside. She wanted to tell him that she wasn’t really cold; she was just shaking from the excitement and the shock. It was like sudden high that her body wasn’t used to but she welcomed every second of it.

“In ten years I’m going to remind you that you said.”

“You won’t have to. I’ve always known that and I’ll never forget.” Tears began to well in her eyes and a tiny squeak escaped her lips. “I’m sorry,” she said through the crying.

He pulled back suddenly very afraid of what she might say.

“What are you sorry for?”

“That I made you wait. That I’ve always known you were perfect and I made you wait.”

He tried to hold back his smile to no avail.

“You are—“ he laughed.

“Don’t laugh,” she said now cracking a smile while tears still ran down her face. “I was really apologizing.” She struggled for the words to say. "Back then you... you were everything to me." She smiled. "You still are."

Her hand tightened around his. It wasn't something they talked about a lot. It was a sort of understanding that they wouldn't dwell on it. “If we start that we will be here all day apologizing to each other for stuff that doesn’t even matter anymore because we made it here. I’d do it all over again if I could tell myself that this is how it would turn out.”

She roughly wiped her face. “Should we call people?”

“No,” he said dramatically. “Because what I have planned for tonight there will be no time to call anyone. And I kind of want to show my fiancée a nice evening.”

She bounced on her heels.

“First,” he reached into the bag and pulled out a bottle of champagne. “A toast, then,” he put the bottle down and reached in the bag again, “sandwiches, ham of course, and not to be out done by that we have…”

“have…” she repeated after his long pause.

“Two pieces of birthday cake, the rest is in the fridge if we need more,” he said proudly.

“Do you want to get the champagne and I’ll get forks for the cake?”

“I knew if for some reason you said no to the proposal I’d get you with that birthday cake.”

“You know me so well.”

Jim pulled off the foil that covered the cork; he planted a foot on the table to rest the bottle on his knee. Pam scurried back into the room, and she cowered behind him, holding his waist when he popped the cork.

“Cup?”

She picked up both of the Dixie cups for him and he poured a generous amount in each.

“To the girl, who at 5 pulled my hair and then generously shared her crayons with me, who at 15 kissed me on the cheek and I knew I was done for, and finally at almost 30,” he whispered the last part.

“In two years,” she retorted with a grin.

“A year and a month, not that we’re counting. To that girl, who lets me kiss her whenever I want, who literally shares everything with me now, and even pulls my hair sometimes in the heat of the moment, a toast for making me happier than anyone else ever could.”

They tapped their paper cups and took a sip.

She bit at the side of her lip when he put his cup down and then put hers down. His hand cupped her face and they kissed tenderly.

“By the way I’ve never pulled your hair,” she said as she picked up her cup again. She fell back on the seat behind her and boastfully crossed her legs.

He rolled his eyes. “Last night,” his fist covered his mouth and he cleared his voice so he could imitate her. “Please Jim, right there,” he mimicked. “Ahhh.”

“That was a love pull. Also worst impression ever.”

“Get used to Beesly.”

“Halpert,” she corrected. “Soon.”

He fell back next to her, his hand immediately went for hers and examined the diamond ring on her finger. And she knew she’d never get him to say it out loud because it was painful to think about, but this almost didn’t happen and she was almost someone else’s wife, his brother’s, and sometimes they just needed to check if this was real.

She pinched his thigh.

“Ouch, thank you.”

7 months later...


With Jim it always felt like it couldn't get any better, first with them being together, then engaged and subsequently married, but now she knew it really couldn't get any better. Pam had been checking her religiously since they brought her home. Her mother told her not to hover, to let her be, she'd let them know when she was hungry or needed a change. It was easier said than done though. She leaned over the bassinet and ran her hand over the tiny fingers, counting them as she moved across them. The baby's hand always made a little fist after she did this before flexing open again.

There was a light tap on their front door and she looked over at Jim to see if that had awakened him, but he was sleeping harder than she had ever seen him sleep. The tap came again even lighter this time, and she placed her palm flat against Cecelia's stomach, a nonverbal "stay put, I love you, please don't wake Daddy".

"Coming," she called when she was out of earshot of Jim and the baby.

Through the peep hole she could see Roy fidgeting, swaying from side to side. She wondered if the loud click of the lock would wake Jim.

"Hi," she happily greeted him. "Is that for her?" She couldn't help but to smile at Roy daintily holding the pink ribbon handle on the pink gift bag with a baby elephant on the front.

"Uh yeah," he smiled back. "Were you sleeping?"

"Oh." She smashed down the puffy mess around her head that had started off as a ponytail. "We're in a constant state of sleep. Come in."

"I'm sorry I didn't come to the hospital. Work," he stated simply. "Where's Jim?"

"Sleeping. Wait here, I'll get her for you."

"No, that's okay. Just give her this."

"I'll get her and you can give it to her." She could always tell when Roy wanted something but was afraid to ask.

In the room Jim was awake now; it was like he could sense a new presence. He was officially their new home security system. "Who's downstairs?" He asked with Cecelia in his arms already.

"Roy." She gave him the eye.

"What? She was crying. Almost crying." He never really needed an excuse to pick her up.

"I'm sure." She loved the way he loved her.

“She was.” He gazed down at her little face and grinned, and then he caught a glimpse of his legs and realized that he was in his boxers. "I should probably put on some clothes. I'll be right down."

They carefully exchanged her. Pam cradled her tiny body against hers as she took the stairs.

"Roy Halpert meet Cecelia Halpert."

Roy nervously turned back to the bag he brought and pulled out a stuffed giraffe. "Here," he said with shove towards her.

"Hold her," Jim said from the top of the stairs. "I haven't taught her to bite yet."

"You would."

He reluctantly accepted her. His arms rigidly held her like she was a porcelain doll. And they both watched him melt. It was an interesting moment for the 3 of them, a turning point. Because no matter what happened between all of them this baby was an innocent and Roy seemed to recognize that.

"She's light," he observed with a sneaking smile.

"You can sit," Jim said.

"Should I? What if I trip or something? I'm going to stand. I'm good at standing." His eyes grew wider as she made a face at him. "She's just like Pam."

"I think she looks like Jim," Pam chimed in.

"She made this face.” Roy ran a finger over her cheek and she seemed to let out a sigh.

"The puckered face? The same one that Pam makes when you say something stupid?" Jim asked.

"That's the one."

"You guys are so funny," she said sarcastically.

"Hey, well I actually have to go. I’ve got some stuff to do today. I just wanted to bring that stuff over while I remembered."

"Oh, okay." Pam took the baby back, slightly disappointed. Like maybe they said something wrong.

"I'll try to stop by next week or something. Here," he said while trying to give the giraffe he had thrown on the end table behind him to someone. Jim took it off his hands. "And there are diapers in that bag too. Mom said you guys could use more."

"Thank you, really," Pam said.

"I'll walk you out," Jim offered.

"Bye, baby," Roy waved from the door.

Jim followed him barefoot onto the front porch. The wood was cold in the shade despite the temperature around them.

"Cute giraffe." Jim waved it in the air between them. He pulled on the purple bowtie that was somewhere around mid-neck on it.

"This cute girl at the store helped me with the diapers and that thing."

"Nice."

"She's really cute."

"Was she?" Jim suggestively asked.

"Cecelia not the girl."

"Oh, yeah! Secretly I was hoping for a little boy," he confessed.

"I thought you'd want a girl. Little girl that looks like Pam."

"I did for about 6 months and then I imagined the boys in high school. I think I'm losing my hair already. She might be the death of me." He pulled at the top of his head and his hair stayed standing up.

"It’s the way you look at her.”

“I can’t help it.”

“You’ve always looked at Pam like that.”

They stood silently, both gripping the railing. There were still so many unsaid things that neither was willing to say more than a year later.

“You smell like ass,” Roy muttered.

“Yeah, probably,” Jim said unapologetically. He picked up his own shirt to smell it. “I don’t think I’ve showered in two days.”

“I’ll stop by next week. You’re off for two weeks?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, see you soon.” Roy left him with a pat on the back. “Good luck with that little one. Love ya, man,” he called from the driveway.

“Love you too.”

It was weird how the second those words were spoken he realized that maybe it was just that simple all along.

“He still loves me,” Jim told Pam with an air of nonchalance as soon as he came back inside.

She let out a chuckle. “I’m so happy for you.”

“Pretty good week,” he mused.

“The best,” she responded.

Cecelia let out a warning cry, and Jim immediately jumped to attention.

“I’ve got her. It’s feeding time.”

“Do I smell?” He questioned as she took a spot on the couch to feed their baby.

“You could just shower instead of asking.”

“What if I miss something?”

“Like her spitting up? Go, please.”

“Okay, okay. Take out tonight?”

“Yes, that sounds great. Now go,” she laughed.

“Have you slept any?”

“Jim, go.”

“Okay. I love you guys.”

In the shower he was sure he missed some spots but he didn’t care. He was just eager to get back to them. He carried the bassinet with him, stopping at the sight of his two girls from the corner. Pam bounced her gently and rubbed her back. She seemed to be dozing off.

“Hey,” he said quietly. Her eyes pulled open. "Let me get her."

"'Kay." She kissed her once on the top of head. Her eyes closed immediately once Jim had Cece.

"Scoot over." She lazily moved up enough for Jim to position himself behind her. “Sleep for a bit." He wrapped his arms around her waist, and it as all she needed to relax and lean back on him.

"I used to dream about you like this before I knew why," she said in her sleep induced daze.

"Me too."

Their fingers tangled near her stomach. Pam would dream about the little boy pulling her through his house, looking for a safe place for them to be. And Jim would think about kissing that girl on the tip of her nose, promising to love her in the face of heartbreak. The air was filled with promises for years that they both knew that the other would do anything to keep especially for the little one resting a few feet away.