Her show starts at eight p.m. sharp, and she’s still applying her make-up as the cab screeches to a halt in front of Chelsea Piers at seven-fifty-five. I could’ve lost an eye, she thinks, tossing the silver eye pencil back in her mustard-yellow purse and handing the cabbie a few dollars from the front pocket of her dress.

She’d taken the subway from Brooklyn, all the while feeling this odd foggy sense that something, something big, was about to change. At first, while straightening her hair and spritzing perfume on her collarbones and down the small of her back, she suspected nerves about the show. It was her first art show – even though it wasn’t hers, exactly. Actually, my life sounds a whole lot less glamorous after first glance. She’d enrolled in a non-credit painting workshop at Baruch College, which met several times a week, and the school was presenting the best work of their art students. It was kind of a coup, really, considering she wasn’t even an actual art student, and that it was the first course she’d taken.

Over the past month, she’d realized that she actually needed to pay her bills (living in Brooklyn was certainly not cheap), so she worked part-time at a Barnes & Noble and was also a receptionist at Baruch, in the Women’s Studies Department. The job wasn’t awful, but a lot of the time female students would come into the office where Pam typed and filed and burst into tears. They’d end up telling Pam about being raped or unexpectedly getting pregnant and needed to talk to a counselor, and Pam would quietly nod and pat them gently on the back until one of the department heads came by and herded the woman into their office. She just wasn’t good with people when they cried. She didn’t know how to handle it; it scared her. In the past, she usually left people alone, gave them their space, time to cool down. She’d always been that way.

As the subway sped through the annals of Manhattan, closer and closer towards the art show, she realized that she wasn’t nervous about her painting. It wasn’t as if anyone of importance in the New York art scene was going to be attending the event. There wasn’t any pressure on her to sell her painting. If anything, it was going to be a rare opportunity for her to dress up, have a glass of wine or two, and gaze out at the beautiful Hudson river and the lighted boats drifting past. It’s funny, she thinks, from certain angles, the river actually looks beautiful. You almost forget about how dirty it is…

Yes, it’s a chance to relax; so why does she feel all… fluttery? Ever since she moved here, she’s been calm, confident. One might even describe her as… ballsy. The way she insisted on joining the painting class even though the semester had already begun. The way she sent her dragon roll back at Ninja Sushi because it was too spicy. She’d actually got into a heated argument with the guy working the sushi bar.

Not now, though.

Smoothing down the front of her black cocktail dress (cut just above her knee and with a thin line of bright purple lace across the neckline and the hem), she thinks about the painting that’s going to be on display tonight. She really hadn’t had a plan on what she wanted to create; it had just come, from somewhere, from the center of her. To someone not “into” art, it probably just looks like a giant purple and black blob. It’s like something a little kid draws, that looks like a tornado, and their teacher has to pretend to smile and say, Tell me about your drawing, because they can’t even tell what it is.

There was a face behind Pam’s tornado, but she had purposely left it blank. The giant dark blob filled almost the entire canvas and completely overshadowed the face behind the paint. She had painted it in her apartment one rainy night, listening to “Besame Mucho” on some weird oldies station on the radio, and once she had started painting, she didn’t think she had looked up again until two hours later, when, covered in paint and exhausted, she had stood up, knees cracking, to examine what had possessed her so.

In truth, the face and the black blur had disturbed her a bit. She doesn’t know what it means. She thought maybe it meant that there was something – or someone – that she felt passionate about, but maybe she hadn’t met them? Yet she had this palpable feeling that a memory in her subconscious hovered right beneath the surface of her mind, never coming close enough for her to identify. It bothered her, and it was bothering her now – that’s why I’m feeling this way, she thought in the subway, and in the cab, and even now, as she walked slowly towards the pier, the cold wind whipping around her, curling insidiously inside her fur coat, which stood brightly against her dark dress.

She waves to her professor across the room; he’s schmoozing with some young attractive art student with bangs and a ripped Arcade Fire t-shirt. She suddenly feels overdressed, and she retreats to the wine bar, which is up against the huge glass window, which spans the entire length of the room. There’s a narrow balcony outside, but of course, it’s freezing, so it’s deserted.

Perfect, Pam thinks, tipping the mustached man behind the bar and taking her Chardonnay with her. She doesn’t see anyone she knows, yet several snooty-looking artsy types give her strange looks as she pulls the door open with some effort. “Smoke,” she says, puffing at an imaginary cigarette. They nod imperceptibly and go back to their elitist conversation.

She doesn’t fit in here.

She doesn’t even smoke.

She pulls her coat around her tightly, trying to protect herself from the biting night wind. Gulping down the wine helps, warms the flutters in her stomach a little. She doesn’t feel like herself tonight. She feels glad that she washed the remnants of the blue out of her hair, but she’s suddenly uncomfortable in the eye-catching coat and curve-hugging dress and black fishnets. Her hair is up in a high ponytail and then teased up and caught in a sparkly butterfly clip, and suddenly it’s all wrong – it’s wrong. She wants, for no reason she can understand, to just be home, in a button-down and jeans – or even better, in gray sweatpants and a t-shirt, with a bowl of mint-chocolate-chip in her lap.

It didn’t make sense. All she’d ever wanted – all she could remember wanting – was to be an artist. And now she was actually on her way. She was living in the city, sipping overpriced and creatively named cocktails, she was around fellow artsy-types – and here she was, in Manhattan, in a beautiful dress, and her painting’s hanging up on the wall – and it was all just wrong.

She was lost.

“I’ve been thinking... 'is that possibly Pam Beesley?',” came a voice from behind her, and she spun around, her heart exploding in her chest, sending a much-needed burst of warmth into her frosty limbs.

“Hello?” Her voice is cautious, questioning. There’s a young man behind her who is conspicuously out of place at this gathering. In fact, she’s not really sure how he actually got in. He’s wearing jeans and there’s a white button-down peeking out from beneath a dark green sweater.

“I’ve been standing over there in the corner, trying to decide if it was really you," he adds.

It occurs to her then that he doesn’t have a coat, which is crazy.

“You don’t have a coat, are you crazy?” she says, placing her wine glass precariously on the railing in front of them.

He takes a step closer, and the light from inside allows her to see his face for the first time. He’s got a nice face. That is, he looks like he’s a nice person. He’s got brown eyes that sparkle with humor from underneath dark eyebrows. He’s got a mess of brown hair – it was too much (and almost made him look a little artsy, but the rest of his outfit gave him away), but he was okay. Red lips. And he was looking at her like… like he knew her, somehow.

Did she know him?

“Are you… Dan?” she asks, smiling back, squinting her eyes in the wind. “Or Paul. Maybe you’re Paul. I know a lot of Pauls.”

He sighs, but the smile doesn’t leave his face. “No, not one of your Pauls. We, uh, knew each other a little bit, when you lived in Pennsylvania.” He peers closely at her. “Do you remember me at all?”

“Hmm…” She knows she’d lived in Pennsylvania and had worked there as a receptionist at a paper company for several years. She’d had a boyfriend, right? And some friends? She did have a couple of friends at work. She knew she had a crazy, politically incorrect, slacker boss, who managed his employees with bathroom humor and an innate desire to be liked. As Pam’s memory tried to expand to the other people in her old office, things got a little hazy. There was an Asian girl who talked a lot… a blonde… someone with glasses… a sales department… that was it. Nothingness.

“Anything?”

“I’m sorry,” she says, smiling apologetically. “I’m not good with names.”

“How about faces?” He’s suddenly standing much too close to her, and although her brain is cloudy, it’s the weirdest thing – her body doesn’t seem freaked out by his nearness. In fact, she suddenly feels a little warm, in spite of the winter.

She smiles, shrugging a no.

“Okay, well, that’s okay,” he says, although he’s lost his smile. “I liked you, you know. A lot.” He swallows hard; she can see his Adam’s Apple bob in his throat. “Actually, I kind of loved you.”

He’s really not my type at all, she thinks, looking out across the river for a moment. I guess that’s okay. “In spite of all that, you seem normal,” she says, looking him up and down. “You’re not a serial killer, are you?”

He makes a goofy face, wiggling his eyebrows and widening his eyes, and she laughs. “That’s about as weird as I get, unfortunately,” he says after a moment. “I make faces, I like to play jokes on people. Occasionally I look in a neighbor’s window, but only by accident, I promise.”

She gazes behind her, into the crowded party, the people dressed in trendy black, clustered around tables with candles in the center, having their secret conversations which she would never be part of. He’s kinda cute, actually. And I don’t want to be here right now.

“You want to get out of here?” she asks, taking another step closer. If either of them moved, their noses would bump.

He’s rubbing his arms, obviously cold. He’s staring right into her eyes as though he’s looking for something inside of her, and the feeling makes her uneasy.

“What are you looking for?” she snaps, suddenly annoyed that he’s not drooling all over her shoes, especially after her offer.

“I… I’d love to, Pam, but I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he says finally, puffs of steam escaping from his mouth as he speaks. His eyes look sad, torn.

“I thought you said you loved me,” she says, insulted. “Way to show it.”

She is nothing like the old Pam, Jim thinks, his brain a twisted mess of regret and guilt and sadness and wanting and… wanting. He can’t take advantage of her this way – and, in a way, he doesn’t want her this way. He wants his old Pam back, the one who would’ve blushed to wear a dress like this one, one who would’ve laughed at his jokes – oh, and recognizing him would have been a good start as well.

He can’t do this.

She’s never going to remember him.

Seeing the blank, unfamiliar look in her heavily lacquered eyes is killing him.

“Look,” he says finally, because she’s standing there, looking cold and like she’s about to cry, “I’m going to give you my phone number. I’m staying in town for three more days, at the Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan. Think about my face, okay? If you remember me – anything about me – call me. If not, don’t worry about it.”

He takes out a notepad from his hotel and scribbles down his cell phone number. He hands it to her, enjoying the warmth as their fingers touch momentarily, and then he’s gone, leaving her standing on the balcony, wondering if this guy was seriously mentally ill or obsessed or what was going on. Maybe she had known him back in Pennsylvania. He certainly looked like he was from Pennsylvania – all preppy and all. And there had been something about his eyes… like he knew her… and considering she didn’t know herself too well these days, there was something tempting about him.

The wind blows, and for a brief instant she considers opening her closed fist and letting his phone number fly. He’d rejected her, and that was just not something she forgave easily. But yet… she shoves the paper down deep into her inside coat pocket, zipping the pocket for safe keeping. Who was he? A friend? An old lover? From the way he’d looked at her, the way their bodies had unconsciously seemed to move closer and closer, she guesses the latter.

She stands out there for a long time.

* * *

He’d lost Jim’s trail late yesterday afternoon, on the way to the subway station. Halpert had checked into some half-way decent hotel in the city and then walked several blocks, slightly uphill, to Grand Central Station. Although Roy lifted two or three times a week, his cardio wasn’t great, and halfway to the station the lanky bastard pulled ahead, disappearing into the crowd. Fuck.

Retreating into a Cosi café for coffee (black) and a donut (glazed), Roy sits at the front window, munching angrily. He needs to find Pam before Halpert. Now that he knows that Pam had both of them erased (who the fuck knew you could actually do that?), it’s the perfect opportunity for him to redo past mistakes, to start over with her. He hadn’t been the best boyfriend, but this time around, he was going to change that.

His truck is parked several blocks away, so he walks there and drives back to DUMBO. What a retarded name for a neighborhood, he thinks. He goes past Mierzwiak’s, scowling at the closed curtain on the second floor, wondering if another poor schmuck is getting the procedure right now, if someone’s right in the middle of obliterating something they had totally fucked up.

* * *

There is.

The two indie college kids are standing over him, reading measurements on machines, hooking him up to something that’s making him sleepy. If he wasn’t still drunk from last night’s solo depressed bar-crawl, he might have fought them, changed his mind, or at least managed to say something.

“Subject is approximately twenty-eight years of age, in good physical health,” says the girl, her blonde hair a halo above his face. “Are you okay?”

He raises an arm that feels a million miles away and gives her a thumbs-up. He’s not sure he could speak even if he wanted to. “And just to recap, you want to delete all memories of Pam Beesley?”

His arm falls back, and for a minute he thinks he sees words floating before his eyes, a picture that he can’t see.

Up until last night, he hadn’t thought anything could have been more painful that the night when Pam had rejected his kiss, his love. But when he had seen her – a Pam that was admittedly hot, but nearly unrecognizable – it was like the old Pam was dead and never coming back. She was an entirely different person, and he wasn’t sure if he could love this new person. Then again, what did it matter – neither Pam loved him back.

“Yes,” he mumbles, "delete her.”

Another figure appears over his bed, holding an ominous-looking, large needle. “Remember what I told you, Jim. This procedure almost always goes smoothly, and the only side-effect you may experience is a mild headache. Oh, and the occasional emerging of repressed memories. Just relax..."

Great, Jim has time to think. And under he goes.

* * *

In Park Slope Roy parks near a YMCA and walks, hoping he’ll somehow, in spite of the odds, catch some trace of Pam. Okay, so maybe Halpert had this stupid crush on her. I’m the one who’d dated her for all those years, I’d almost married her for Christ’s sake. If either of us should be able to find her, it should be me. I knew her when she had braces, I was there when she lost her virginity, and I’m the only guy she’s ever been with (and it had better stay that way). I know her best.

He passes a bar and considers stopping for a mid-morning beer, then thinks better of it. He’s going to try and be a better guy. A guy who thinks about others, a guy who might burn Pam a CD or tell her a funny joke if she were having a bad day.

It’s cold, and Roy’s black puffy winter coat just isn’t getting the job done. By 11:30 he needs to get warm, and he needs another cup of coffee, so he ducks into a nearby bookstore to defrost and regroup.

As he walks inside, his breath catches in his throat. Standing behind the coffee counter, wearing a t-shirt ripped up the sides and held together with oversized clothespins, looking tired and a bit hungover, is Pam Beesley – or someone that looks very much like her. Her hair is in braids and – Roy almost has a heart attack – a silver stud shines from the side of her nose.

“Oh my God, Pam.”

She looks up wearily at him, as if to say not again.

“Hi, what can I get for you today?”

“Don’t you remember me?”

“What the fuck. What is with people asking me that lately?"

He grips the sides of the counter in frustration. Even after speaking with the doctor, he can’t believe that she actually doesn’t remember anything about him, about the life they’d had together. “Pam, I don’t know how to tell you this, but you had part of your memory erased.”

She rolls her eyes. “Sir, are you high?”

“Could I just talk to you in like a break room or something for ten minutes?” he pleads, looking around to see if any of the other customers are staring. They’re not – yet. “Please?”

“Sir, I just came back from break. Anything you need to say, you say right here.”

This is Pam? He thinks in wonder. This creature is… was… Pammy? He can’t believe it. She’s so… aggressive. And she looks different, smells different.

“Pam, you had a procedure done so you wouldn’t remember me. But we… we knew each other before. We were in love. We worked together. You were engaged…”

She stares down at her ring finger, which is bare. “I was… engaged?” She sounds shocked.

“You were engaged,” he repeats, leaning across the counter, staring her down. “You were going to marry this horrible guy who didn’t love you, didn’t understand you. I loved you, but I never said anything, because I didn’t want to make things, you know, complicated. But it all turned out fine, you left the guy and made the right decision, and we were going to be together… and then you disappeared.”

“Are you kidding? Is this a joke? Cause it isn’t funny,” she says. Inwardly, Roy smiles. Clearly the story means something to her, even if she doesn’t remember it.

“I’m not kidding, Pam. I followed you up here to try and find you, and that’s when I found out about the memory erase.”

She’s silent for a painfully long time. Then, she glances around the room and looks back at him, hundreds of questions in her eyes. “I don’t know if I definitely believe you, but I guess it wouldn’t hurt to take a quick break. There’s a café around the corner, I could get out of here for a little while.”

“How about you meet me for dinner instead? I wouldn’t want you to get in trouble,” he adds, reaching across the counter and squeezing her hand. He gets half an uneasy smile in return.

“Okay… wait!” she says, as he backs away. “Where are we going? How will I find you?”

Oh, duh, you idiot. “Uh, what time do you get off? I’ll come back here and get you.”

“At seven.”

“I’ll be back here at seven then.”

“Okay. Wait!”

He turns back, and he is struck again by her drastically different appearance; then he reminds himself that in the dark, she’ll look the same. Unless she has… other things pierced now, he thinks, and has to clear his throat to replace the image with one of kittens, Yankee stats, and hot cocoa with his grandmother.

“I feel stupid asking this, but what’s your name?”

“Jim,” Roy says, a guilty grin creeping across his face. “Jim Halpert.”