He’s aching even though it wasn’t much of a fight.
Karen’s taken pity on him; instead of pestering to go out, they stay in, sitting together under the dull light of his living room. It’s a weird silence, full of questions Karen didn’t want to ask and he didn’t want to answer, so they both dance around the topic without actually touching it.
“I’ll get you ice,” she says when he murmurs something about his cheek hurting, and before he can protest she gets up, padding barefoot into his kitchen. When she comes back she has a dish towel full of ice, and she eases herself into a seat next to him.
He offers to take what she brought, but she shakes her head and gently presses the ice to his cheek herself. The fact she’s still taking care of him even after all that’s happened makes his heart ache in a way it hadn’t in a long time. It’s the first time he really, truly feels guilty about the situation, about the secrets, about everything.
“I’m going to have to teach you how to do a right hook,” she says after they fall silent for a long time, and he knows she’s desperately trying to lighten the mood. Her voice mimics the movie perfectly when she adds, “You’re gonna be a contender.”
He laughs at that, even shoots her a genuine smile that he didn't know he had in him. “That’s it I need to take your movie collection away from you. When you start quoting that movie to me, there needs to be an intervention.”
She just scoffs, rolling her eyes. “Just because you have bad taste in movies, doesn’t mean I have to, Halpert.”
It’s almost like normal, for that brief moment. But what happened still happened, and the silence rolls on back like a choking fog. She shifts against him, pressing it a little harder against his cheekbone, and he hears her audibly sigh. He sits there for a while, trying to just soak in the moment, and finds himself hating that it all isn’t enough for him, no matter how much he wants it to be.
“About today…” he finally says, and he can see in her face she just knows it’s another Pam thing. It’s always about Pam.
He tells her, then. She sits and listens, not asking more than he’s giving, and he isn’t giving much. When he looks at her out of the corner of his eye, he can see her face fall, and that ache returns.
“He wasn’t right for her,” he finally says, as if frantically trying to validate his actions, because he sees the disapproval in her gaze. “I am.”
It’s too late to catch himself, and he knows she heard it too. He opens his mouth to correct himself, - noreallyImeantwas - but she’s already pulling away and standing. He goes to stand up to, to apologize, to do something, and she stops him with a look.
“Don’t,” she says, arms crossing against her chest. He catches her gaze before she looks away, and can see she’s fighting back tears. He knows she won’t cry in front of him.
“Karen,” he says, even though he doesn’t know what he can say.
“I can’t do this anymore, Jim,” she continues, and her voice sounds so tired. “I can’t.”
And she leaves. Jim considers going after her, to make a big gesture to try to win her back, and in the end he decides against it. She doesn’t deserve it, he doesn’t deserve her. He sighs and slouches in his seat, picking up the homemade ice pack and ignoring the fact it was already melting. He presses it against his face and closes his eyes, wondering if this means he should do something; if this is a sign, like he thought it was a sign when Jan gave him a way out. With how that turned out, though, Jim isn’t so sure he knows them when he sees them anymore.
It’s for the best, he thinks. Maybe he’s meant to be by himself, because whenever he tries otherwise, this is how it turns out.
It’s how it always turns out.
--
Sometimes she thinks she’s clinging on the hope of a happy ending that’ll never come.
The night after it happens, she wanders around her apartment aimlessly, as if doing enough laps around the small space would somehow revive life as she once knew it. She wasn’t happy before, she sees that now, but she isn’t happy now either. Things have crashed all around her, and nothing is how it should be – how she thought it’d be.
At midnight, she gives up on watching TV and tries to paint instead. The blank canvas has to have a picture on it by the afternoon when one of her classes meets. She’s been uninspired since she got the assignment, but suddenly the picture is in her mind and she transfers it to paper.
They say you can tell how an artist is feeling through their artwork. Pam is no different, and the dark strokes and lines and colors all betray what she’s trying to hide from herself. And when the painting’s all finished, and there’s nothing to pour what’s left of her emotions out of her, it comes out through a torrent of tears that surprises even her.
It takes her a long time to pull herself together; to stand and wipe at her eyes uselessly. It’s funny; days ago she had said she was a new Pam, a Pam who had said she’d go for what she wanted, but all the life changes she has promised herself is fading away. She stands near the phone and thinks about calling him, but her hand stills when she imagines Karen picking up, voice groggy with sleep. She thinks maybe he wouldn’t want to talk to her even if Karen isn't there; maybe even not ever again, after what happened.
Excuses, excuses, excuses. They stopped her before, they stop her now. She drops her hand and turns to leave when the phone springs to life. The sudden sound makes her jump, and she grabs at it and there’s hope that’s dashed in seconds when she realizes it’s her mom calling her back.
“Pam, honey, what’s wrong?” she asks, when Pam pauses right after answering to stop herself from bursting into tears again. She slowly slides down to sit against the wall, clutching the phone to her ear, her other hand nervously playing with the cord.
“Everything,” she finally whispers.
It’s just like that night, all over again, and the same feeling of sinking with no one around to grab her hand to pull her out.
Author's Chapter Notes:
This is set post-Cocktails. Written for the we_take_five challenge. The prompt was "isolated".
traceace is the author of 9 other stories.
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