After escaping Andy, Jim hurried through the rest of the mall. He quickly ran down the list of the other Dunder Mifflin employees in his head, trying to figure out if he should be on the lookout for anyone else. He knew for sure that Dwight wouldn’t be at the mall on Black Friday, or on any other day for that matter. There’s no way Angela would partake in any of this. He doubted that Stanley or Merideth would be awake...he was probably safe now.
When he finally reached FYE, he was relieved to see that it wasn’t quite as crowded as some of the other stores. Apparently they had no big sale going on just for that morning like other stores did. He walked in and went up to a shelf adorned with holiday decorations which had been dedicated to various holiday films.
“Now let’s see...what was I supposed to get...” Jim asked himself as he pulled out his list. He scanned the shelf looking for “Christmas Classics Collection”. His eye was quickly drawn to a red and silver box bearing those words. This had to be it, right? Then, his eye caught another box. This one was blue, and had the words “Christmas Television Classics” on it. He then noticed a third box with the title “Christmas Television Favorites”.
“Of course...” Jim said. “This can’t be easy, can it?” He held the red box in one hand and the blue box in another. Both had pictures of Rudolph on the front, but the blue box also had a picture of the Grinch.
“Why release two DVD sets of the exact same thing?” he wondered aloud as he tried to decide which one Pam really had wanted. The list had said specifically “Christmas classics collection”, but Jim wasn’t sure if Pam had specifically meant the one in the red and silver box with that exact title, or a general collection of Christmas classics, which there seemed to be an unlimited number of.
Jim looked at his watch. It was now 7 in the morning. He had spent half of his alloted time and had only obtained two of the items on the list. In a move that even he would come to regret, he started grabbing every DVD collection off the shelf with any variation on the phrase Christmas Classics in the title. He ended up with six different sets.
As he handed them to the bleary-eyed cashier, she said “Wow, you sure must love Christmas!”
Jim smiled as politely as he could, repressing his desire to explain to this young lady that not only did he not love Christmas right now, he was beginning to hate it. As he walked out of the store, he began to pull his list out of his pocket. Before he could read the next item, however, he heard yet another familiar voice.
“Hey, Jimbo! What’s going on?”
“Oh, for the love of God...” Jim whispered to himself. He took a deep breath and turned around, and sure enough Michael Gary Scott was standing right next to him.
“What are you doing here? Never took you for an early bird.” Michael asked, his hands full of various shopping bags.
“Oh, I’m not. I’m actually here with Pam...”
“No kidding, Pam’s here too? I just bumped into Andy a little while ago...it’s like everyone from the office is here. Too bad we can’t get paid for today, huh?” Michael said.
“Yeah, um, actually, I should be going, I have to go meet Pam at the food court...” Jim knew that saying he had more shopping to do would most likely be taken as an invitation for Michael to come along.
“Oh, good. I’ve got to head that way to meet Jan.”
Of course, Jim thought. Jan was here too. Although he wouldn’t quite put it past his boss to get up at the crack of dawn to come shopping on his own accord. He took a deep breath, realizing there was no way he could talk his way out of this one. At least he would have the time spent walking through the mall to come up with a reason why Pam wouldn’t be at the food court, since he wasn’t actually supposed to meet her for another 45 minutes.
As they were walking towards the escalators, Michael suddenly grabbed Jim’s arm. Jim turned his head to the left, and noticed they were right in front of Victoria’s Secret.
“Hey, you might want to go in there and get something for Pam...”
“Oh, I’m not really doing that today.” Jim said quickly, trying to avoid the conversation that was rapidly coming up.
“All I’m saying is that when I took all the girls there that day Phyllis got flashed, all she got was this robe. I felt kind of bad for her.” Michael didn’t notice Jim’s discomfort with the topic at all, although that was to be expected.
Jim took a moment to absorb the fact that Michael had taken all the women of the office into Victoria’s Secret. He had always meant to ask how that trip to the mall went, but when Michael’s relationship with Jan blew up minutes after the returned the subject had left his mind.
Suddenly, Michael let out a yawn. “Man, it feels like I’ve been up forever. I don’t know how Jan talked me into this.”
Ahh, so Michael was in the same boat as Jim. “Maybe she asked you right after Thanksgiving dinner. That’s what Pam did.”
“No kidding...you two spent Thanksgiving together?” Michael asked.
Uh-oh. That statement was a bit more loaded than Jim had intended it to be. “Um...yeah. We went to her parent’s house.”
“Wow. You guys are like...a real couple.” Michael said.
“Yeah.” Jim replied, pausing for a moment. “Yeah, we are.”
When the two men reached the food court, neither Pam or Jan was anywhere in sight. They waited for about twenty minutes, with Jim constantly hoping Jan would appear around the corner and take Michael away so he could try to get some more items off his list. Although, running into Michael was a pretty good excuse for not completing his mission.
“So, when exactly were you supposed to meet Jan?” Jim asked.
“At 7:15. I have to carry the bags out to the car so she doesn’t have to carry them around all day.” Michael said.
“Well...shouldn’t you be meeting her by the front doors then?”
A look of realization came across Michael’s face. “You’re right. I’m supposed to meet her under the food court by the front doors! Come on, let’s go.”
Jim didn’t bother to ask why he was being dragged along. At this point, he was too tired to fight anything anymore. He followed Michael down the escalator and to the front entrance where he had left Pam an hour and a half ago and took a seat next to Michael on the nearest bench.
Michael let out a yawn. “It’s been a long day” he said, leaning against the pillar next to the bench.
The act of sitting down had caused Jim to lose whatever motivation he had to keep himself awake. He managed to nod in response to Michael’s statement, before dozing off himself.
Author's Chapter Notes:
Sorry it's been so long. I discovered that most of my writing time is actually when I'm in class, and being home on winter break for a month took that time away. But now I'm back at school, and I've got several really boring lecture classes that will hopefully give me enough time to wrap this story up.
