August 25, 2007 9:17 pm

Pam closed her eyes for a moment and absentmindedly twirled a piece of hair around her finger. The scene was perfect in her mind. A playground in the middle of the park filled with tall green trees and drooping willows. A young girl is on the swings. She has long blond – no, wild curly hair. She is laughing as she pumps her little legs and the swing gets higher and higher. There is a boy with unruly brown hair on the slide and his mischievous smile confirms that he is up to something.

Her pencil moved quickly over the page, sketching the little details as they visualized in her mind. There are two adults sitting in the background, two adults who bare a strong resemblance to the children. Her hair is curly, his unruly. They watch the children while talking to each other.

Pam’s hand stilled as she realized what she had done. She bit her lip and regarded the sketch with a smile, taking a moment to focus on his features, the way he is leaning back, his long legs stretched in front of him and crossed at the ankles, the way his arm is slung over the back of the bench, his hand resting on the woman’s shoulder. Her shoulder.

With a shake of her head she flipped the page to a blank one, reminding herself that she actually had work to do, there was a deadline to meet and she couldn’t keep drawing these images of how she imagined the future. Or maybe not the future. But… something.

The blank page stretched out before her, empty and white and waiting to be filled with the pictures and images of her mind.

Only… it was Saturday night and as much as she loved art and sketching and bringing those said pictures and images to life, there were other things that she would rather be doing.

Although, she had to admit, this moment was nice. More than nice.

Perfect.

In the way that perfection can actually be achieved in those rare little splinters of time when everything just… fits.

This was one of those moments and she wanted to drink it in and savor the taste on her tongue and never ever get tired of that flavor.

Stretching her legs out along the sofa she dropped the sketchbook a little so she could glance over the top and peer around the room.

It was stupid really how gleefully proud she was of her little apartment. Of the little details that made it her own. The flowers on the kitchen table, the artwork on the walls, her keys in the bowl on the table by the door. At first it had been daunting to live by herself in an apartment in the middle of a city she was still just getting to know. But she surprised herself once again.

Turns out she could be by herself. She could be alone. And it was freeing. It really was.

Independence had given her a feeling of empowerment that she had never felt before.

Although…

Maybe it negated all the feelings of independence she felt, but her absolute favorite thing about the apartment, about her new life, was how much apart of it he was.

Sometimes, even after he left, she would still feel him there, his scent, his presence… it was comforting on those nights when she really didn’t feel like crawling into bed by herself.

So it was his sweatshirt that she wrapped herself in so that maybe she wasn’t really alone.

And it was his Shins CD currently playing softly through the speakers of the stereo and his shoes laying next to the coffee table where he had kicked them off earlier and his keys that were sitting with her keys in the little bowl on the table by the kitchen door.

She had noticed it when she let him in, the way he threw them in there like they belonged there, like he belonged here in her apartment.

The thought made her stomach flutter and she mentally chastised herself for getting all worked up about the co-mingling of their keys.

So stupid.

She shifted slightly so that she could glance down at where he was currently sitting on her living room floor, leaning back against the sofa, his legs stretched under the coffee table, engrossed in the book he held in his lap.

It was one of those things that she had learned about him that year. He liked to read. She liked that he read. That he loved reading and plowed through books at amazingly fast pace, passing them along to her at a rate she couldn’t keep up with. Beside her bed there was a pile of books that he had recommended but she hadn’t gotten through yet.

And she liked the fact that he recommended books. And that she knew that he liked reading. That she knew that he also played guitar, not well, but he could strum out some slightly recognizable tunes.

He was also allergic to strawberries, his favorite food was soft shell crab, he had broken his arm and chipped his tooth falling out of a tree when he was seven and at nineteen he had cried when his dog died while he was away at college.

She liked these things about him.

She liked that she knew these things about him and that he knew the same meaningless, yet important, stuff about her too.

Ignoring her sketch, she watched his profile for a moment, noticing the way his jaw twitched slightly when he was thinking hard and how his tongue darted out every once in while to wet his lips, the way his gray tee-shirt was just tight enough on his arms and chest to display the toned muscles when he moved and how very tall he looked with his legs stretched out in front of him like that.

He looked up at her then and arched his eyebrow, “Did you need something?”

She shrugged, “I’m bored.”

“Not really a lot I can do for you then.” Jim turned back to his book with a smile.

“Jim!” She pushed her foot against his shoulder and added a hint of whininess to her voice, “You’re supposed to entertain me.”

“Hey. You’re the one that invited me over and then proceeded to work all night. Not my fault.”

“I have to get this done.”

“Then don’t whine to me that you’re bored.”

“Let’s go do something.”

He looked back up at her with a smile, “You just said that you have to get that done.”

“I’ll do it tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow’s Jenny’s wedding shower.”

Pam dropped her head back, “Oh God. How could I forget?”

“Not really sure. That’s all she ever talks about anymore.”

“Seriously Jim, I love Jenny but she’s turned into a neurotic bride. Please tell me I wasn’t like that.”

Jim pretended to think about it for a moment, “No comment.”

“Hey!”

“Kidding.” He smiled up at her and shook his head so that a piece of hair fell into his eyes. “You were not neurotic.”

“Thanks and you seriously need to get a hair cut.”

“I like it.”

“It’s way too wingy.”

“Wingy?”

“Um, yeah. Farrah Fawcett wingy. Not a good look.”

“Hey… don’t go there. I’m trying to grow it out.”

She scrunched up her nose, “Please don’t.”

Jim just made a face at her and looked back down at his book. She chewed thoughtfully on her bottom lip, her fingers itching to touch his hair, run her hands though it and tug on the ends. Yes, his hair definitely had a tuggable quality about it.

She balled her hand into a fist and looked away, tapping her pencil on the blank sheet of paper.

Damn his hair.

“How many sketches do you have left?” He kept his eyes toward the book but she could tell he wasn’t reading anymore.

“Three. Danielle just wanted some rough sketches to look at on Monday. Just a concept really.”

He nodded, “Feeling a little unproductive?”

“Yeah.” She nodded toward the sketchbook, “This is not what I want to be doing on a Saturday night.”

He shook his head, “You love it.”

Pam bit at the side of her thumb nail and smiled back at him.

She did love it. And sometimes it was all too surreal that it was her job to do the thing that she loved. To make money with her art.

It was definitely a far cry away from, “Dunder- Mifflin this is Pam.”

“I can leave if you want…”

“No.” The word came out a little stronger than she intended and she ducked her head in embarrassment, “No… it won’t take that much longer. Maybe then… I don’t know. We could go for a walk or something.”

Jim grinned widely back at her and pushed himself up off the ground to sit on the edge of the couch by her feet, “Sounds nice.”

“Yeah…” She looked down at her paper and coughed, “Besides, you could use the exercise.”

His mouth dropped open, “Whoa. What are you implying?”

“I’m just saying. You weren’t exactly on your game during the pick-up--.”

Jim interrupted and held up his hand, “I was getting over the flu.”

“Excuses, excuses. I’m starting to think that you’ve been lying to me all these years about those basketball skills.”

“Hey, what about that game against the warehouse? I outscored all those guys.”

Pam made a face, “Yeah, you outscored Michael. Big achievement.”

Jim shook his head in disbelief, “I can’t believe I’m hearing this. I thought you said I was pretty good.”

She shrugged, “Pretty good. But I’ve seen better.”

“Yeah?” He cocked his head to the side and met her eyes in challenge.

Pam could feel his gaze all the way to the tips of her toes. She threw up her hands, “Fine, I admit it… you’re better than pretty good… even with the flu.”

He smiled, “Thank you.”

“But you still need to exercise.”

Jim shook his head, “Fine. But first you need to finish that.”

She grimaced and looked back down at the paper, feeling the way his gaze remained on her, feeling the way it warmed her and she hoped he couldn’t see the blush in her face.

He rested his hand on her ankle and she looked up in mock disturbance, “I’m trying to work here.”

“Fine. Work away. Mind if I grab something to eat from your kitchen?”

“Go ahead. There’s leftover Chinese in the fridge.”

“Thanks.” He stood up, stretching his arms over his head, “You want anything?”

“I’m good.”

Pam watched him head into the kitchen then turned back to her sketch, trying to concentrate.

When she heard the freezer door open instead of the fridge she threw down the sketchpad and leapt up from the couch.

“Don’t even think about it!” She yelled the words as she slid into the kitchen, her socks sliding on the slick tile. Jim caught her arm before she could go flying into the table.

“Whoa there. I thought you weren’t hungry?” he said with a laugh.

She righted herself and pointed at the pint of Cookies N’ Cream he held in his hand.

“That’s not Chinese.”

“Very good.” He nodded toward the bowl of apples on the counter, “And what are those?”

Pam glared at him and grabbed the ice cream, “This is mine.”

“Wow. Didn’t anyone teach you how to share? I’m going to call your mom.”

“Fine. But she’ll support me on this one. You don’t steal a woman’s ice cream. Besides, I offered to by you some at the store and you didn’t want any.”

“I wasn’t hungry then.”

“I told you there was leftover Chinese.”

Jim stuck out his lower lip and widened his eyes a little, “Fine. I guess I’m not that hungry after all.”

“Oh don’t pull that puppy dog eyes shit with me Halpert.”

A smile tugged at his lips but he managed to make his face drop even further. Pam regarded him narrowly but she couldn’t help the way those hazel eyes affected her. She let out a sigh and turned around to grab two spoons out of the drawer.

“I hate you.”

Jim laughed as she handed him a spoon. “No you don’t.”

She rolled her eyes and pulled the lid off the carton, “The cookie chunks are mine.”

“Fine.”

They leaned against the counter together in silence, taking turns digging their spoons into the ice cream. Jim was careful to pull out all the little cookie chunks and leave them for her. She smiled as he did this and unconsciously edged a little closer so their arms brushed against each other, bare skin against bare skin.

It still made her heart beat a little faster, to be this close to him, to be so familiar with him. Their relationship had always been based upon some heightened level of physicality but in the beginning it had been just simply finding a way to touch his hand or sit close to him in the conference room.

Now it had become something more of a fierce competition to see how close they could get before one of them snapped. The hugs that lasted a split second longer than normal, the casual manner in which she would brush her hand against his leg when they watched a movie together, the innocent way his fingers would trace against the back of her neck when he draped his arm over chair during dinner with friends.

Sometimes it was all too much to handle.

But she reveled in being close to him, in feeling his enveloping presence and there was something about standing next to him that made her feel completely and utterly safe.

He smiled down at her and licked the back of his spoon.

“Michael called me today.”

She scrunched up her nose and giggled, “That’s your own fault.”

“Yeah. Thanks for reminding me of that.”

“What did he want?”

“Well, apparently Dwight and Angela are engaged. He announced it to everyone at work yesterday.”

“Oh, and I bet everyone was shocked.”

“Oh yeah.” Jim rolled his eyes, “I guess no one really seemed to care all that much and Dwight kind of freaked out.”

“What did Michael have to say about it?”

“Considering the fact that he had no idea about the whole thing? He was disturbed. As we all were… are…”

“How does he stay so… I don’t know… oblivious?”

“I don’t know Pam. It’s something I think only Michael can do.”

“So… is Dwight going to ask you to be his best man?”

Jim let out a short laugh, “Um, I’m willing to bet he’s not going to let me within ten feet of that wedding.” He glanced down at Pam, “And I’m sure Angela’s going to call you any day now and ask you to be her maid of honor.”

“Oh. Yeah. Definitely.”

“I wonder if they’ll have it on the beet farm.”

Pam laughed, “Too bad he’s not still a volunteer sheriff. He could have worn the uniform.”

“Come on Pam.” Jim pursed his lips in laughter, “Let’s not make fun. You know you’re jealous.”

She scowled, “Of Angela? Um… no.”

“So, you never had a thing for Dwight?”

“I’m not going to even pretend to joke around about that one… Please Jim, just don’t put those images in my head. Just… don’t.”

He laughed and nodded in defeat.

Pam poked her spoon into the ice cream and dug around a little bit until she uncovered a large Oreo piece. She pushed it toward him and he grinned.

“Can you imagine what their children would be like?”

“And I’m the one bringing up disturbing images? Come on.” He tilted his head and regarded her with a pleading face.

She laughed, “Fine. Fine.”

They fell into a comfortable silence again, slowly eating away at the ice cream until Pam scrapped the last bite out of the bottom. She licked her spoon and leaned her head down to rest against his arm, “Hmmm, that was good.”

He nodded and she could practically feel the smile that was spreading through his body. She leaned deeper into him and looked down at her feet.

“Maybe we should forget about the walk. I’ve done enough running around today.”

“You’re the one that insisted on running around to every party planning store in the city.”

“No. That was Jenny. She and her mom dragged me around town all day. My feet are killing me.”

“Huh.” And before she realized what he was doing, Jim’s hands were on her hips, lifting her up easily and setting her down on the counter in front of him. Pam’s mouth dropped open.

“Better?”

Much better.

His hands were still on her hips and her shirt had ridden up enough that his fingers were grazing the soft skin there. She tried to nod, tried to make some kind of sound in her throat but her mouth had gone dry and all she could do was look up into his eyes.

The moment seemed to have caught him off guard and when their eyes met his breath started coming in shorter little gasps. He swallowed hard and moved his hands then, sliding them down to rest on the counter on either side of her.

Everything was starting to go foggy again.

“Oh… um…”

The words were the same and the memory came to her in a flash. The way he had looked at her, made her weak in the knees, made her forget everything she had ever known. But he had been unable to say the words that were in his eyes that night and they had stood there for how many seconds of excruciating silence.

“Oh… um…”

Almost everything had changed since then.

Except that nervous flutter under her skin was the same. The tightening low in her stomach was the same.

It was still Jim.

It was always Jim.

He was looking down now at some spot on her jeans and that piece of hair was falling into this eyes so that she wanted to reach out and brush it away. Wanted to run her hands up to his hair, over the back of his neck…

She laughed then and ducked her face into her shoulder.

“Listen… Jim…”

When his eyes caught hers she opened her mouth to--

But of course it was at that moment that the phone rang. Because when else would it ring than at the most pinnacle of moments?

Whoever was on the other line could wait. Pam started to shake her head but Jim dropped his shoulders, reached out for the phone and handed it to her.

“Hello?” She kept her eyes on him as he paced the kitchen.

“Pam? Oh my God. I’m freaking out.”

“Jenny? Listen, can I call you back? I’m kinda--.”

“My sister’s got the flu and she’s not sure if she’s going to make it tomorrow and…”

“Jenny, relax. Your mom and I took care of everything today and I’m sure if Lisa’s feeling better she’ll try to make an appearance tomorrow and…”

“John wore socks to bed last night.”

Pam looked upward and swore under her breath. Jim glanced at her in the middle of his pacing and she bit her lip, apologizing silently. He smiled softly, shook his head and waved her out of the kitchen.

Her fingers curled tightly against the phone as she walked to the bedroom, listening to Jenny babble incessantly in her ear. This was definitely not what she wanted to be doing and she found herself once again watching helplessly as another moment of perfection slipped from her grasp.

It was enough to make her scream.

Or cry.

An hour later when Jenny was convinced that John’s socks weren’t going to spell doom for their marriage Pam was finally able to hang up the phone. She rubbed her ear and bit her tongue in annoyance.

Someday she was going to make Jenny pay for that one. No. That wouldn’t be enough. Her children were going to have to pay for that one.

Pam clutched the phone to her chest and moved back out to the living room, ready to apologize to Jim for the interruption. She stopped short though when she saw that he was sprawled out on the sofa sound asleep.

A momentary wave of mixed disappointment and relief spread through her body.

It was the relief that worried her because she knew that if she didn’t make some sort of decision, some sort of movement soon, then maybe all of it would slip from her grasp.

Moving into the kitchen she noticed that he had washed both their spoons and propped them up to dry in the drain board by the sink. The sight brought tears to her eyes and she clutched hard at the counter.

So so stupid.

The whole thing. It was stupid and juvenile and she was tired of letting everything pass her by. Sure, she had learned to take more risks, learned to not be so scared. So, why was this one so hard? Why was it so hard to just grab onto this moment, this person and let those emotions pour over her?

She flipped off the light in the kitchen and pulled out a blanket from the hall closet. Jim was lying on his back, his arm thrown over his eyes, his mouth hanging open slightly. Pam covered him up and sat back on the table.

Jim Halpert.

Her best friend.

Five years ago he had just been this friendly face. The first person to greet her at Dunder- Mifflin. The first person to make her laugh. The first person to make her feel comfortable.

There really was no defining moment of epiphany when all that changed. When he became more. It just sort of happened.

And now…

When she closed her eyes and pictured the future she really did see him and he was more than her best friend and more than a friendly face and more than the person who made her feel comfortable.

She thought of the little boy and girl from her sketch.

Yeah, it was something.

Jim murmured something in his sleep, tossing his head a little and smacking his lips together lightly. That piece of hair dropped into his eyes and she smiled.

He really did need a haircut.

Tentatively she reached out to brush the hair from his forehead. It was soft under her fingertips. She trailed her hand down the side of his face, surprised when a picture of Roy popped into her head.

“Do you love him?”

Somewhere, at sometime, the answer had changed.

Or maybe she was just starting to wake up to it all. Maybe now it was just starting to make sense in her head and maybe, just maybe it didn’t have to be so complicated.

She flipped the living room light off and headed toward her own bedroom, her head awhirl with thoughts of tomorrow.