The week after his vacation had been hell. He spent his days at work brushing off questions about the trip and spent his nights sitting on his couch drinking imported beer. By the second week everyone had stopped asking questions and he was grateful. He figured he must have looked terrible because even Michael was leaving him alone.

Things had returned relatively normal after a while and he started to feel like maybe he would get through this okay, but then something terrible happened: Valentine's Day.

Angela had decorated the office with hearts and streamers and it all made Jim physically sick. He toyed with the idea of going home early, but he didn't want Michael prying into his business or, worse, trying to cure his illness with chicken soup and tasteless jokes. He sat at his desk all day, doing his work and trying his best to ignore the dying fire in his chest.

A few minutes before the lunch break, Abby went around the office and passed out homemade Valentines to everyone in the office. Angela disapproved because she considered some of the cards "inappropriate," but accepted hers all the same because it was in the shape of a cat and Abby had written 'You're the cat's meow!' on it.

Abby's Valentine to Jim was a basketball and proclaimed him 'a slam dunk of a guy'. He smiled at the effort and put it on his desk, in the spot where the picture of himself and Pam used to be. He considered it a stepping stone in his recovery and decided to have lunch. He grabbed his sandwich from the fridge and went to the break room.

Abby was in the room by herself, reading a textbook and taking notes. Without looking up from her notes, she said, "Hey, Jim."

"Hey," he said and sat across from her. "Thanks for the card. Does Hallmark know about you?"

"They're interested," she replied. "They're sending over a contract." She cleared her throat. "So... you wanna talk about it?"

Somewhere along the line, Abby had come to be like a little sister to Jim. Over the few months that Abby had been working at Dunder-Mifflin, they had bonded over lunch, college professor war stories, and a never ending game of tic-tac-toe. Abby's psychology classes just made her a different kind of pesky little sister.

"About the contract?" Jim replied as he took his sandwich out of the brown paper bag. "I don't know. I'd have a lawyer look over it, I just sell paper."

Abby rolled her eyes and looked up from her textbook. "I learned about avoidance last week, you know."

"I don't have anything to talk about," Jim said and shrugged.

"You're such a guy," Abby sighed. She ripped a piece of paper from her notebook and drew a tic-tac-toe box in the corner. She drew an X in the top left corner before sliding the paper and pencil over to Jim. "Well, anyway, Jeremy called me on Saturday."

"I don't like that kid," Jim replied. He drew an O in the center box and slid the paper and pencil back to Abby.

"You've never even met him," Abby said. She drew another X.

Jim grabbed the paper and pencil from her. "Not relevant. Kid's a bum." He drew an O under his previous one.

"So, what you're saying," Abby said as she took the pencil and paper from Jim, "is that you don't even have to meet someone to know that they're right or not right for someone that you do know really well? Like, you just have to hear stories and stuff from other people and it's possible to figure that kind of stuff out. That is the point you're making?"

"Yes," Jim said. "It's entirely possible to do that is what I'm saying and from what I've heard, from you - the kid's a bum."

"So, I guess that I would be able to tell the same about you, right?" Abby said. She looked Jim in the eye. "I mean, if I had heard a lot about someone and you, from, like, everyone in this office, then I could -"

"Nope," Jim said and shook his head. "That is different. That is - are you ever going to make another move or what?"

"Funny," Abby said and smirked. "I was gonna ask you the same thing."

She made an elaborate show of drawing her last X. She slid the paper over to Jim and smiled. "I win."

She picked up her textbook and notes then stood. "Don't worry - I'm not going out with Jeremy again. He was a total d-bag the last time I saw him, anyway." She hugged her book close to her chest. "And I mean, if someone like you, who knows a lot about me and clearly knows that -"

"I got your point like five minutes ago," Jim said. He slid the tic-tac-toe paper around in circles with his index finger. "I appreciate it, I really do, but... I don't think so. Water cooler gossip isn't the whole story, so don't believe what you hear around here. Especially if it's Creed talking."

"Well," Abby said, "if you ever need to talk... I could probably find someone for you."

Jim crumpled up the tic-tac-toe paper and playfully threw it at her. "Thanks. Is your mom still single?"

"You are sick," Abby said. She made an exaggerated disgusted face. "There is something wrong with you, seriously."

"Go to your desk," Jim replied. He smirked. "See, I'm practicing for when I totally marry your mom and become your father."

"Holy inappropriateness in the workplace, Batman," Abby said and shook her head. She tried to hide her smirk.

"A toe over the line," Jim agreed, grinning.

"Try a leg," Abby said. She stuck her tongue out at him and left the break room.

Jim put his hands on the back of his head and leaned back in his chair. However thinly veiled it may have been, he had just had an easygoing, light conversation about Pam, something he wasn't sure could ever happen. Sure, it still hurt like all hell, but it wasn't the end of the world.

Maybe, just maybe, he was going to be okay.