* * *
“Oooh, okay, I got one. J.K. Rowling or Oprah?” Pam lugged her beat-up stereo into the bathroom, putting in one of the several mix CD’s Jim had made her for the summer.
“Oh my God, Beesly, you are insanely good at this game. Or maybe insanely bad. Tell me again why we keep playing this?”
“Because it’s fun.”
“And also rather creepy. Think about what you’re really asking me, Pam.”
“It’s kind of a simple question, Jim. Who would you rather do? Now come on, decide already.”
“Well, Oprah’s kind of hot, and she’d probably at least buy me a car, but if I did J.K. Rowling I might be able to weasel out Harry Potter secrets.”
“Quit stalling, Halpert. You’re making this a lot harder than it needs to be.” She smiled as she lit another candle, one of Jan’s creations, surprisingly. Michael had given it to her one morning, choked up and mournful, asking her to take it because he “couldn’t bear the lingering scent of their doomed love.” Luckily, the scent of the candle itself was rather nice.
“That’s what –”
“Don’t you dare,” she interrupted. “I’ve got enough reminders of Michael here as it is.”
Jim was obviously confused. “Enlighten me, Beesly.”
Pam lowered herself gingerly into the tub, bracing herself against the scalding water. “I’m taking a bubble bath and I lit one of Jan’s candles.”
“Oh,” he replied, pausing. “It doesn’t smell like Michael, does it?”
Pam snorted, nearly dropping the phone. “No! Ew! It smells good, actually, kind of sweet and sugary. I think it’s making me a little hungry.”
“I’m more than a little hungry right now, Beesly.” Jim’s attempt at a sexy voice was ruined by his evident struggle to keep from laughing.
“Shush, you. Besides, you never answered the question.”
Jim let out an exaggerated sigh. “And here I was working so hard to distract you.”
“Nice try.”
“Fine, Rowling. If only because I would definitely enjoy holding Harry Potter secrets over Dwight’s head.”
“I know, right? It would so be worth it.” She waved a hand idly through the froth of bubbles before adjusting the volume on the stereo.
“Hey, is that one of the CDs I made you?”
“See how much I love you? I listen to your music even when I don’t have to,” she teased.
“No, you’re listening because I have awesome taste in music. And because you broke the new iPod I got you.”
“Jim, that thing was so small! I totally forgot it was in my pocket when I put my jeans in the washer!”
“ - and the dryer.”
“Shut up. You should have known better.”
“It’s not my fault you’re a mini walking disaster. I swear, it’s like having my own tiny war zone.”
“I hate you.”
“Aw, don’t be mad, Beesly. I’ll make it up to you this weekend. Oh, and I’ve meaning to tell you - Wallace found out I was coming up this weekend, and he offered to take us out to lunch. Would that be okay with you?”
“Of course! Looks like you made quite an impression there, hotshot. Michael’s going to be pretty upset when he finds out you’re being lured away to corporate. Or maybe he’ll want you to be his new Ryan.”
Pam frowned as she heard him chuckle nervously. “What’s wrong?” she asked, concerned.
“Well, I was going to tell you when I got there and let it be a surprise? But now I’m wondering if maybe it might be better if I just told you right now.”
“Tell me!” The words came out as a half-shriek.
“Okay! So I ended up talking about you to Wallace, and how you were at Pratt, and that you were really talented –”
“Jim, what did you do?!”
“And I happened to have the Dunder-Mifflin ad with me, the one with your animation at the end, and Wallace ended up really liking it. He told me he wanted to meet you. So, um…surprise?” he finished weakly, clearly unsure of her reception.
She was stunned. “Why…” she began slowly. “Why did you even have that ad with you?”
“I’m not entirely sure,” he admitted sheepishly. “Just my luck, I guess. But I don’t want you to freak out or anything, everything’s going to be fine.”
“I don’t know what to say, Jim. I didn’t expect this at all. Wow.”
“It’s a good thing, Beesly.”
“I know, I’m still trying to process it, I think. And Jim?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you,” she said forcefully, trying to convey how touched she was at his thoughtfulness. “It means a lot to me that you’d be thinking about me at a time like that.”
“I’m thinking about you nonstop, anyway. I figured we’d get something constructive out of it,” he joked, brushing off her thanks.
“But aren’t you jealous that Wallace will like me better?” she teased back.
“Nah. It all works out in my favor. It’ll be easier for me to sleep to the top if you get promoted.”
“Sounds kind of kinky, Halpert.” Pam grinned, heat rising to her cheeks.
“Wouldn’t have it any other way. Now is there anywhere else you want to go when I come up? Maybe catch a show or something?”
Pam smiled softly, settling in comfortably against the head of the tub. “Honestly, Jim?” she confessed, “I would really rather just stay in. I feel like it’s been so long since I’ve been able to even touch you, you know? It feels weird.”
“No argument here,” he chuckled. “We can do whatever you want.”
“Not to mention you probably haven’t eaten a square meal since I left. I need to cook you some real food.”
“I love you.”
“That’s just your stomach talking, mister.”
“I think we both adore you equally.”
“I can live with that.”
For awhile neither of them said anything, and a sweet, hazy calm settled on her simply listening to Jim’s even breathing on the other end of the line.
“You know, when I was in elementary school, my art teacher told us that Van Gogh cut off part of his ear and sent it to a woman he loved, who’d rejected him.”
“That’s…really gross, Pam. That sounds like something Dwight would do. Maybe I should tell him that story.”
“Jim!”
“Sheesh, I’m just kidding.”
“Whatever. Anyway, I mean, yeah, it is kind of gross and all, but I found out today that it wasn’t true.”
“He didn’t cut off his ear?”
“No, he did. But not for a woman. Turns out he was crazy at the time. But I was, I don’t know, I was a little disappointed. I mean, it was part of his ear. That would have been a pretty serious gesture.” Pam bit her lip, trying to find the words to express what she meant.
“Um, Pam? I like you a lot, but I’m not sending you a body part in the mail.”
“Gah, Jim stop it. It’s just, can you imagine that? Can you-” She stopped mid-sentence, and then blurted out, “Do you really not regret turning down that job for me?” She was slightly shocked to hear the words tumble out of her mouth. It was something that had been bothering her vaguely, but she hadn’t quite realized till then how deeply it had rooted. She hadn’t meant to bring it up at all, but the damage was done and she waited tensely for Jim to answer.
“Whoa.” Jim sounded bewildered. “That kinda came out of left field, Beesly. Are you comparing the guy’s ear to my turning down the job? Because I’m not really seeing the connection.”
Pam struggled to explain what she meant, wishing she could rewind their conversation to back before her mouth had gotten the best of her. “I just feel bad sometimes. Like you gave up that opportunity for me. And not just that but before too, when you stayed doing the same thing for all those years. I mean, it’s bad enough that I kept holding myself back, but when I think that maybe I was holding you back, too, I –”
“Stop. Don’t go any further. First of all, I refuse to let you take the blame for me not giving a damn about my job. And that interview…Pam, that was me trying really, really hard to be something that I thought I should be. In my entire life there has never been anything I wanted as badly as I wanted you. You were this ache, this - God, I don’t know how to make you understand! I’m obsessed with you, Pam. I’m so wrapped up in you that I can’t think any further than what I want for you.” His voice dropped lower and lower, until he finished a little sadly, “You need to tell me what to do to make you stop questioning this, because it’s killing me that I can’t make you see it.”
Pam let his words wash over her, let them settle into the knots in her stomach, let them stretch her and smooth her out. The bathwater had long turned tepid, and her fingertips had shriveled; they felt odd as she brushed them across her arms.
“Jim, that’s not it at all, I swear. I know how much you love me, and I know that I have never, ever been so loved, or so cherished, and I’ve felt so safe, and that’s all because of you. I just can’t stand to think that in any way I might have kept you from doing something important.”
“I can’t think of anything more important than you. And if there’s anything to regret, it’s all that time I wasted trying to get over you. I messed a lot of things up.” Jim’s voice was like dark leather, smoky and weary and old.
She sighed and ran her fingers through her wet curls, wondering if the pain of looking back would ever cease to be so raw. “Maybe…maybe you won’t agree with me, and maybe you won’t even like what I’m going to say, but being together and happy with you now makes me feel like it all needed to happen. We both had so much growing up to do, and maybe we wouldn’t have made it without all that stuff in between. We might not have been ready.” She heard Jim exhale a long breath, and she shivered a little in the cooling water.
“I don’t think…I don’t think I’m ready to accept that yet. I can’t just look back and drop the blame and really believe that it was all meant to be the way it was, I can’t. But you’re right. We’re fine now, and that’s all that really matters, because I have you and I can’t even think to ask for anything else.”
“I love you,” she said at last. There didn’t seem to be anything left to say. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”
“Let’s save a couple of those for this weekend, alright? I want to hear a few of those in person.” Jim still sounded husky, but Pam thought that maybe some of the cracks had been smoothed over, that the promises they made were sharpening into focus.
“Why aren’t you here already? I don’t think I can wait any longer.”
“Patience is a virtue, Pam.”
“I’m not really in a virtuous mood, Halpert. Too bad there isn't a travel-size version of you. That would come in pretty handy,” she mused.
“I don’t even want to know where you’re headed with this, Beesly. Besides, I’m not sure you’ve noticed, but I’m a one of a kind, special edition Jim. A collector’s item, if you will.”
“Ooh, I’d collect you!”
“And keep me in a glass box in your room?”
“I don’t think so, sweetie. I had you pegged for more of the ‘action figure’ type,” she replied, aiming for nonchalance but failing miserably by giggling when he started to laugh, too.
“You’re my favorite, Pam."
“Your favorite what?” she asked, grinning madly despite it all.
“My favorite.” he repeated warmly, as though it explained. “My favorite everything.”
She could hear the clock in the corner, each tick-tock finding its way under her chill, wet skin. The candle still burned gamely, though the cloying scent of it had long since curled around the floral notes of the bubble bath to hang heavy in the tiny bathroom. The bubbles had disappeared, leaving her to contemplate her puckered knees and soft stomach as music spun slow from the stereo, putting a heart in her hands and words in her mouth.
“Yeah. Mine too.”
* * *
Author's Chapter Notes:
I'm dedicating this chapter to NanReg, because she's pretty much awesome.
Chapter End Notes:
Oh my. I'm not sure where all this is headed, but I'm enjoying myself, and I sincerely hope that you are, too!
