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Story Notes:
They ain't mine...If they were Karen would be swimming with the fishes and Jim and Pam would be drinking Mai-Tais on the beach.
Author's Chapter Notes:
I hope you like this little intro.

 

Today is her 40th birthday.

 

She thinks it would be easier to get old if she actually felt old.

 

She doesn’t.

 

Feel old that is.  Maybe it would be easier to feel that way if she had a significant other who she could measure her age against, someone who she could chart the years with by his receding hairline and incrementally enlarging waist size.

 

But she doesn’t.

 

Maybe she feels young because she’s single again, for the first time in a very long time and it reminds her of her difficult, lovelorn 20s and of her carefree teenage years.

 

Maybe she feels young because she teaches young adults all day at Scranton University. One of the other Professors in the department once remarked that his students were his fountains of youth; they constantly infused him with their enthusiasm and their vitality. And although she wanted to smack some of her students occasionally, on most days, Pam couldn’t agree more.

 

Maybe she feels so young because she has two young children and being a single mom is sometimes more like being a really cool older sister. Since she doesn’t have an adult partner in crime all her meals are kid friendly and she hasn’t watched (or had) sex in any form in a long time.

 

Maybe she feels young because 40 is young.  And everyone else is just crazy.

 

She still thinks her Mom looks young and acts young as is young, and she’s going on 65. 

 

Maybe age is just a number; but going around saying that today sounds too much like denial.

 

Luckily she doesn’t have to celebrate tonight. Her friends wanted to go out, chief amongst them Kelly, who Pam is frankly amazed she’s still friends with all these years later, but Kelly is mostly so gung-ho because she’s far enough away from 40 that the number hasn’t started to loom over her with it’s heightened significance.

 

Pam doesn’t have to celebrate tonight because tonight is Open House at her children’s school; she thinks it’s oddly fitting to be doing something so adult in a setting so childlike on her birthday.

 

But truly, Pam couldn’t care less it’s her birthday this year. Her Mom and Dad sent her roses this morning and her kids made her breakfast in bed and cleaned up before going to school.  And as touched as she is at these gestures, she’s just happy that her kids seem to be doing better this year than last.

 

Last Open House she had had serious Parent-Teacher conferences on Annie’s depression and on Josh’s behavior. Those meetings had led to kid support groups and summer camps on dealing with divorce. Now, a year later, they’re the poster children for resilience and Pam couldn’t be prouder.

 

Not to mention that on last year’s Open House she had practically bawled when she realized that this would be the first year that she would be going alone, that for the rest of these kids lives- she would be it.

 

It was more pressure and responsibility than she thought she could handle, but she’d made it and they were doing great. In Pam’s eyes this is a more significant accomplishment than managing to stay alive for four decades.

  

“Mom, Mom! Come here, I want to show you my poster, it’s on the Outstanding Board.” Pam smiles as she feels her son tug her hand towards the back of the classroom, his enthusiasm is adorable and it is in these moments that she wonders how it is possible that two such withdrawing people had given birth to such an outgoing boy.

 

“This one is mine, and that one’s Kate’s, and this one is Alex’s.”

 

“Isn’t Alex the new boy in your class?” she asks.

 

He shakes his head vigorously, “He’s so cool Mom and he’s having a birthday party next week at his Grandma’s house and he wants me to come and I forgot to ask but I can go right?” The information usually spews out at her from her son’s mouth at lighting speed so Pam is used to deciphering his almost frantic speech.

 

“Have his Mother call me,” it is her stock phrase and it hasn’t failed her yet.

 

“He doesn’t have one, I mean he does but she lives in Paris or something and he lives with his Dad and his sister on the same street as his Grandma and his Dad is really cool too, he came with our class on our last field trip and when the bus broke down we had the 4th grade Olympics and he taught us this game called Flonkerton but he said we couldn’t play right because…”

 

“Joshie, what did you say?” Pam asks as she grips her son’s arm tightly.

 

“Ow Mom, you’re squeezing really hard.”

 

Pam is immediately contrite and drops down and places a kiss on his forearm, which for an eight year old boy is infinitely worse, “Mom, get up…you promised no kissy stuff in school,”

 

“Right, sorry,” she says sheepishly, “Now Flonkerton?”

 

“It’s this game where you tie boxes of paper to your feet and have a race but since we didn’t have boxes of paper we used some bricks that were laying around and Mr. Halpert said that was fine because desperate times call for desperate measures or something like that and he was really funny and…”

 

“Mr. Halpert?” she asks and she’s pretty sure her voice cracks.

 

“Yeah, Oh Mom, Alex is here,” and with that he’s off like a pistol shot.

 

Somehow the Mom in her manages to kick in a little because she still calls after him not to run at school and she’s going to say more too except that the words die on her lips. Because taking up the doorway is the still adorably lanky frame of a man she thought she’d never see again.

 

Chapter End Notes:

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