----
I can't even look at Pam. My stomach is churning and my nerves are shot. I can't wait to just get out of here, get home.
We don't talk at all in the car. I'm not really mad at her, although I think maybe she could have done something when Toby groped her in front of God and everybody...but then I'm disgusted with myself for not doing anything and I'm still so horrified by the whole security gate disaster that I don't know if I can face these people ever again. Maybe it's really just time to quit. This second foray into management has only confirmed what I've always known: I must get out of here. Before I become Michael.
Surreal. This entire day...absolutely surreal.
First Michael this morning. What do you mean, "that's still going on?" Jesus! Is it in any way not clear that Pam and I are together?
Well, given what happened with Toby, apparently not.
And then this whole disastrous evening...what a nightmare. It seems like every time I try to take some initiative it blows up in my face.
Disorganized, slipshod, careless... clearly not suited for management, Halpert, or decision-making responsibilities of any kind. Face it.
Yeah, definitely my fault for not telling the security guard. I get that. But I can't help but wonder...how did he fail to notice all the cars in the parking lot when he locked up? Isn't he supposed to do a perimeter check or a walk-through or something before he heads out? At this point I'm glad we forgot to tip him last year. Which, incidentally, was just something that came up in conversation with Oscar one day in the break room but was never actually a definite plan...how did that become my fault too?
Because you're the number two, dumbass. You're supposed to take care of stuff like that.
They may hate Michael, but they sure as hell don't have any reason to respect you, do they?
And as if that whole ghastly situation wasn't enough, oh my God, what the hell was that with Toby? What the hell was that with Toby?
If I'm honest with myself I have to admit I've known something was up from the day he basically rejected our effort to register our relationship. But then tonight, the hand on her knee--what the hell?! Right in front of me?
My hands are shaking so badly I can't fit the key into the lock and Pam steps up and puts her right hand on top of mine, warm and steady. It stills me, and she looks up into my face with a worried kind of frown as she gently guides my hand to open the door, her left hand calmly supportive on my back. She steps inside first, because ladies first, as my mama taught me, but the moment I shut the door she turns around and goes to throw her arms around me. She's a little more forceful than I expect and I'm pushed back against the door and the knob jabs me in the kidney.
"Ow, fuck!" I gasp, jumping back from the door, my eyes watering with the sudden sharp pain. And that's it, that's just the last motherfucking straw. I've never been one to start throwing things around but I feel like I'm seriously about to lose it and do something crazy. I'm a donkey on the edge! my brain screams maniacally.
"Oh, God, I'm sorry!" She reaches under my jacket to rub my back and I hate myself for flinching at her touch, but I'm trembling all over and I feel like I'm about to jump out of my skin. She pretends not to notice or maybe just doesn't care and steps closer to gingerly put her arms around me. "I thought you probably needed a hug," she says softly, pressing her cheek into my chest. "I know I do."
I love her so much at this moment.
I wrap my arms around her and hold onto her like a life preserver for what seems hours. Her warmth and her closeness and the scent of her hair is enough to calm me, but at one point I start thinking about how Toby came up big tonight when it mattered and how she was smiling at him and I start shaking again.
She clutches me harder and buries her face against my chest and I can feel her shoulders trembling; is she crying? I pull back a little to look down into her face and when she looks up at me I'm floored.
She's laughing.
I'm standing here on the brink of tears and howling and a full-blown nervous breakdown of Jan Levinson proportions and she's laughing.
"Oh, Jim," she gasps, shaking her head. "I'm sorry it's just...this whole night..." She presses her lips together and she's still shaking her head and her face is pink as a raspberry in her hysterics. "Could anything possibly have gotten any weirder?"
I'm not really ready to move on to laughing about it just yet, but it's something of a relief to know she is. To be honest I'm still more than a little freaked out about what happened with Toby and I'm not sure that either one of us reacted properly. I guess we were both too stunned to do anything? But it has definitely occurred to me that Roy would not have just looked at him, like I did. Roy probably would've grabbed him by the throat and thrown him over the fence before he had a chance to run away like he did.
I guess there's a little comfort in that...at least Toby knew it was a fucked-up thing to do. Is he really moving to Costa Rica? Is that why he did it? Or did he just say that because he wanted to shrivel up and disappear the way I did when Roy caught me holding Pam's hand that time?
She tugs on my tie to pull me down to her and puts her palm on the nape of my neck as she kisses me, a long, warm, soft kiss that immediately releases about fifty percent of the suffocating tightness in my chest. As she pulls away she trails her fingers over my cheek and gives me an amused and affectionate smile, stepping behind me to bolt the lock as she shucks off her shoes. "Worst night ever?" she wonders.
"Top five," I agree, watching her hang up her jacket in the closet and loop her purse on the doorknob and experiencing, not for the first time, a mixture of relief and awe at the easy familiarity with which she makes herself at home in my apartment. She pats me on the butt as she passes by into the kitchen. "I don't know about you, but I need a drink," she calls over her shoulder. "Beer or wine?"
"Anything stronger?" I mutter as I kick off my shoes and drape my suit jacket over the back of a chair.
"What?"
"Beer's good." I follow her into the kitchen and she hands me the bottle of merlot we picked up last night. "Open please," she requests, reaching into the fridge to get me a beer. I open the bottle and she pops the top on my beer like we've done a hundred and more times before.
I can't pretend yet that everything's okay. We sit next to each other on the couch and I peel the label off my beer and she contemplates her wine and neither of us talk or turn on music or the TV to break the silence. She's waiting for me to speak.
I decide to skip all the bullshit about the security guard and that whole catastrophe and cut right to the chase because nothing else really matters to me right now. "So Toby's in love with you," I say, striving for a light tone.
I can tell I don't quite manage it by the way she looks at me, startled, her eyebrows drawing together. "No, I...no," she stutters.
"Yeah, I think so," I nod. It's not like I don't know the signs. I'm the expert, aren't I?
"Do you really think he's moving to Costa Rica?" she muses.
"I hope so," I mutter.
She looks at me in surprise and frowns just a tiny bit, which inexplicably makes my stomach tighten up in a knot. I put my beer on the coffee table. My throat's all closed up and I can't drink it anyway.
"Don't say that," she says softly. "It's not...I think he just has a crush on me, that's all."
Like I had a crush on you?
"Maybe," I mumble. I don't want to fight with her, not ever, but especially not about this. I don't want to be the crazy jealous boyfriend. I have no intention of kicking Toby's ass, even if I should. I'm supposed to be secure enough in our relationship that this is strictly a funny/weird thing that happened and we can both go straight to laughing about it. She looks like she wants to do just that so why do I feel this sick twisting in my gut?
I'm scared to death that you don't really love me the way I've always loved you. That I will always love you more than you love me, and someday, maybe someday soon, you'll leave me and I don't think I can survive that again.
There. That's the sum of all my fears and doubts. But how can I say that to her? She'll accuse me of not trusting her, and rightly so, I guess. Most of the time things are so great between us that it seems we've been together forever, but there's a tiny part of me that hasn't healed, a part of me that's still afraid she'll crush me with that one word, can't.
She doesn't know I have a ring and that I've been waiting for the right time for months now, waiting for...what? Some kind of irrefutable proof that she won't reject me again? I don't even know exactly what it is I'm looking for. I thought our little "hypothetical" conversation about engagements and moving in together was a really good sign and I've been thinking of ways to propose for the last few weeks but now...what happened? Now it's just like before and my hesitation has let others get the idea we're not together? How can this be happening?
"Do you think I was being flirty with him?" she asks me, her eyes on her wine as she swirls it around in her glass.
No. Yes. Don't smile at him. Don't smile at anybody but me.
Christ, Halpert. Get a grip.
"Not intentionally," I say, thinking this is a safe answer.
Her face tells me I'm wrong.
"So I was being flirty with him?" she challenges, indignant.
I sigh inwardly and think very carefully about what I want to say. "No," I say cautiously. "Not flirty, no...what I think is that Toby is..." in love with you "...has a crush on you and if you're... friendly ...with him he might get the wrong idea."
He might "misinterpret," I almost add, but I keep that one to myself.
I'm bracing myself for an angry retort but she just presses her lips together for a minute, her eyes still on her wine like it's got the mysteries of the universe contained within. When she finally looks up at me her expression is remorseful and I'm not sure what to make of that until she says, "I'm sorry I didn't...say something, or push him away. I should have, I was just so...surprised, you know?"
I don't know what to say. Surprised...yeah, that's one way to put it.
A worried frown creases her forehead as she looks at me, and she puts her wine down on the table and scoots over to sit half in my lap, tucking her head under my chin and wrapping her arm around my waist. "Thank you for not, you know...doing anything to make it more...awkward," she murmurs.
I wanted to. I wanted to slap his hand off of you and say "What the FUCK, man?" and deck him in the jaw.
But I didn't because that's not who I am and is she saying she's glad of that? I think so. I hope so.
"I hope he does go to Costa Rica," she says softly, her voice muffled against my chest. "He's so unhappy...he's been so unhappy for so long...maybe that's what he needs, a change of scenery..."
Maybe. Didn't work for me, but sure, maybe.
"I couldn't stand to be that far away from my kid," I think.
She looks up at me with something so soft and loving in her eyes that I realize I'd said it aloud. She hikes herself up higher on my chest and kisses my cheek and murmurs so quietly I almost don't hear it, "You won't have to."
And then she reaches out for her glass of wine and clicks on the TV and curls up under my arm as she scrolls through the menu for a movie we can mock together. "Ooh, The Poseidon Adventure," she says happily, waggling her eyebrows hopefully as she looks up to check for my approval.
"Definitely," I grin. I don't really care. Having her here is one thing I've managed to get right today.
We order Chinese and I not only finish my beer, but help her polish off the bottle of wine. By the time we stagger off to bed it's around one in the morning.
That's when I remember I never called Hank back to tell him the cleaning crew let us out.
Pam stares at me, mouth open in horror before she dissolves into giggles. "Better make it a really good tip this year, Halpert," she smirks.
-----
Story Notes:
My first post! Bear with me while I figure out the formatting...still working on how to insert italics...
Standard disclaimer applies. Not my characters, etc., etc.
Standard disclaimer applies. Not my characters, etc., etc.
Chapter End Notes:
Comments/reviews are welcomed and appreciated!
callisto is the author of 22 other stories.
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