**********************

Pam walked into the living room where her son was lounging on the couch watching TV.

“J.D., can you please take out the trash?”

“And then feed and walk the dog,” Jim said as he joined them.

“Okay.”

“Oh, and then--”

J.D. clapped his hands over his ears. “Mom Mom Mom Mom Mom Mom MOM!” he exclaimed. “Stop it! Too much at once!”

Pam looked at Jim, horrified.

“My God,” she said. “He sounds like Michael.”

**********************

**********************

“Come on, Mollie, it’s not that bad. There are tons of frames to choose from!”

Pam put her arm around her daughter as they stood in the optometrist’s office, perusing the large display of glasses frames in front of them. Mollie crossed her arms and scowled. She was not pleased about having inherited her mother’s eyesight.

“This sucks,” she muttered.

“I know, sweetie, but lots of kids wear glasses. I was 10 when I first got glasses, too.”

“Hmmph.”

Jim walked over and picked up a pair of frames from the display.

“Here,” he said. “Try these on.”

“No.”

“Come on, they’re purple! You love purple.”

Mollie looked up at Jim, raised an eyebrow, and pursed her lips.

“No.”

Jim and Pam looked at each other, eyes wide.

“Angela,” they said in unison.

**********************

********************************
“James Daniel Halpert!” Pam bellowed up the stairs. “Get your butt down here right now!”

She heard a thump above her, and then footsteps coming down the stairs. J.D. casually sauntered into the kitchen.

“What’s up, Mom?” he asked nonchalantly. Pam crossed her arms and glared at him.

“I think you know.” She gave a small nod towards Mollie, who was sitting on the counter with her arms crossed, scowling.

“Um… no?”

Pam stepped aside from the counter, revealing a large dome of Jell-O. A Barbie was suspended inside.

“Explain.”

J.D. bit the inside of his cheek, trying to keep a straight face. “Um…” He pushed his hand through his messy, sandy brown hair, feigning innocence. “Wow. I have no idea. I think Mollie’s trying to frame me.”

“I am not!” Mollie shouted. “You put my Barbie in Jell-O!”

Jim arrived home then, and came into the kitchen.

“Hey guys, what’s-- uh… uh-oh. What’s wrong?”

Pam pointed to the Jell-O, and then to Jim.

“I blame you for this.”

Jim looked at J.D., both trying not to smile.

They both failed miserably.
********************************

********************************

“I’m not eating meat anymore.”

Pam, Jim, and J.D. stopped talking and looked at Mollie, who had pushed her plate of chicken casserole away. Jim cleared his throat.

“Um… what?”

“I’m a vegetarian now,” she replied.

“Mollie,” Pam sighed. “Please just eat your dinner and we can talk about this later.” Mollie stuck her jaw out defiantly.

“I’m just thinking about my health,” she said. “Fact: women who eat meat every day have 3.8 times the risk of developing ovarian cancer.” She crossed her arms, resolute in her decision.

Jim closed his eyes and groaned.

“Mollie, if you want to be a vegetarian, that’s fine. But please… don’t start a sentence that way ever again.”

********************************

*************************

“Ohmygod… no way! …No way!”

Pam turned her attention away from the pots and pans in the sink and peered into the living room, watching Mollie as she cradled the phone between her cheek and her shoulder, meticulously brushing bright pink varnish onto her toenails.

“Okay, but did he say that he ‘liked her,’ or that he ‘liked her, liked her’?” Mollie continued as she capped the nail polish and bent over to blow a stream of air onto her toes. “I mean, there’s like, a pretty big difference.”

Pam shook her head and chuckled as she turned back to the dishes. At thirteen years old, Mollie was a typical teenage girl; always on the phone.

A moment later, she jumped as a squeal came from the living room.

“Omygod, I know, right? He’s soooooo cute!” Mollie giggled. Pam couldn’t help but laugh as she noticed that Jim had come down the stairs and was staring, blank-faced at his daughter, seemingly perplexed by her behavior. He shook his head and came into the kitchen.

“When the hell did Kelly get cloned?” he asked, sitting at the table and laying his head down on his arms.


*************************

*********************

“A-B-C-D-E-F-G…” J.D. sang as Jim focused the video camera on him. “H-I-J-K-N-N-N-O-P.” Jim chuckled. He loved how little kids pronounced that part of the song.

“Come on,” Pam prompted. “What’s the rest?”

J.D. put his hands on his hips and continued, “Q-R-S-T-U-V… Duhyu-X-Y n’ Z!” He began to dance around. “Duh-dah-doo-doo! Now I know A-B-C… Da-da-da…”

Pam looked at Jim with a raised eyebrow.

“Uh-oh,” she said. “Here comes treble…”

*********************

J.D. shoved his hands in his pockets and looked at what seemed like an endless array of baby products while Mollie and their cousin Vanessa helped Pam pick out a gift for his Aunt Penny.

"Come on, Mom," he whined. "How long does it take to pick out a present?"

"Oh, calm down," Pam sighed. "It won't be much longer. Just look around and pick something."

J.D. let out a quiet groan and turned to his cousin Nate. "God, this is so boring," he muttered. Nate nodded silently.

J.D. grabbed a small box from the shelf and examined it.

"Lanolin," he read aloud. "For treating and protecting sore nipples." His eyes widened and he looked at Nate, who was beginning to smirk.

J.D. snickered. "Nipples..." he whispered.

“Mollie? Mollie, sweetie, wake up,” Pam said gently, smoothing her daughter’s hair off of her forehead. “It’s all over. You’re all done.”

Mollie’s eyes fluttered as she muttered something incoherent.

“She is really out of it,” Jim whispered, chuckling lightly. Pam smiled and tried again.

“Mollie, honey, the operation went really well. They took your appendix out, and you’re going to be okay. But you need to wake up now.”

Mollie slowly blinked her eyes as she drifted into consciousness, struggling to focus on the blurry images of her parents.

“It’s all done?” she asked groggily. She reached down and felt the bandage on her abdomen. “Is my stomach still there?”

Pam looked at her quizzically. “Your stomach?”

“Yeah… is it still there?”

“Yes, sweetie, your stomach is still there. They took your appendix out.”

Mollie nodded and closed her eyes again. A moment later, they flew back open.

“Where am I?” she demanded. “I can’t see... glasses. I need glasses.”

Pam and Jim exchanged worried glances as Pam fished Mollie’s glasses out of her purse.

“Don’t worry,” the nurse reassured them as Pam slipped Mollie’s glasses onto her face. “It’s normal for her to be disoriented. It’ll pass.”

Mollie continued to look around the hospital room in bewilderment. She held her hand out in front of her. “Is this real? Is the hand real?” Pam reached out and took Mollie’s hands in her own.

“Yes honey, it’s real. You’re in the hospital. You had to have your appendix taken out, but you’re going to be fine.”

“I feel weird…”

“I know you do, sweetie. The medicine they gave you makes you feel weird. It’s okay.”

Mollie looked back and forth between her parents, and then let her head fall back into the pillows of her bed.

“Okay,” she mumbled. “’Night.”

Jim gave a small laugh as he sat on the edge of the hospital bed. “Wow, that was weird,” he said. Pam nodded in agreement.

“It was like she was drunk!”

Jim nodded, and then laughed again.

“We’d better watch her… make sure she doesn’t set her hair on fire.”

****************************************

The Buddy Holly glasses weren't too worrisome. That was the current style. The fedoras were a bit outdated, but some social circles still found them acceptable. But when J.D. started popping the collars of his pink shirts, they knew that he needed to stop getting fashion advice from Ryan.

****************************************

****************************************

"Mommy?"

Pam looked up from her book to see Mollie standing in the doorway of the living room. She knew something was wrong; her 11-year-old daughter didn't call her "Mommy" unless she was sad or scared.

"What's wrong, sweetie?"

Mollie sat down on the couch next to Pam. "Mom, I don't want to go to middle school."

Pam put her book down. "Why not?" she asked.

"Because it's scary."

"Oh honey, I know it can be scary going to a different school, but all your friends are going to be with you, and --"

"No!" Mollie interrupted. "I know they'll all be there. But I'll never get to see them!"

"What do you mean?"

Mollie's eyes began to swim with tears. "They split you up," she whimpered.

Pam furrowed her brow, confused. "What?"

"The teachers and the principal find out who your friends are, and then they make it so that you are never in the same class, or even on the same bus! And you can't even eat lunch together!"

"Mollie, I don't think --"

"And the 8th graders make you clean their lockers and carry their backpacks and buy their lunch for them!"

"Mollie, that is absolutely not true. Where did you hear this?"

"J.D. told me."

Pam sighed, exasperated. "J.D.!" she yelled.

"What?" J.D. replied from upstairs.

"Quit messing with your sister!"

****************************************