After the abrupt and rather curious beginning of the day, things went from odd to worse for Pam.

“You’re not still into Jim, are you?”

“Oh, yeah. I mean no. Sorry. I was confused by your phrasing. I’m not interested in Jim. You should totally date him. I mean you are dating him, and that’s great. You guys are a great couple. Sorry.”

“What are you sorry about?”

“What?”

“You said you were sorry.”

“Oh, I was thinking about something else.”

After their discussion about Jim in the break room, Karen kept stealing glances at her with an expression somewhere between sympathy and fear. Pam was relatively sure it was all Rose’s fault.

Pam’s mind had spent the whole day stuck on the sheer absurdity of her morning. It was one thing to sit across the table from Rose and believe her when she said she came from a parallel universe, one where Pam’s life was a popular television show. It was another to consider it while she was alone, suddenly hyper sensitive of her actions and her words.

All afternoon she was overwhelmingly aware of the cameras, and for the first time in almost two years she found herself obsessing over her portrayal of herself and shredding plastic cups into little pieces, trying to make flowers out of the remaining plastic strands.

So she arrived home that evening exceedingly unhappy, with a paper plate full of left over cake and Ben Franklin’s phone number tucked away in her purse. She’d gotten stuck at every red light on the drive home from the office and was nearly convinced that when she arrived home, it would be empty; that Rose would have been just a figment of a lifetime career of sniffing too much White-Out. If she was being completely honest with herself, she kind of hoped the house would be empty, that she could collapse on the couch and just forget, armed with her fuzzy slippers and the rest of the cake.

But when she opened the front door of her apartment she was greeted by blasting pop music and the faint scent of burning oil. “Hello?” she called out.

“Oi! You’re back! Don’t…” a loud clanging noise interrupted Rose. “Bugger! Where did that –fuck that hurt. Stay where you are! Don’t come in here.” Pam frowned and slowly set the cake down on her front table, unbuttoning her coat and trying not to panic.

“Please don’t break my kitchen.” She called out halfheartedly.

Rose appeared from around the archway looking rather disheveled and carrying two large glasses filled with frothy pink liquid. “Voila!” she gestured grandly, adding a little curtsy. “Careful, I may have been a tad heavy handed with the rum.” Pam looked at Rose, her face a little shiny with the red flush that suggested she knew exactly how heavy handed the rum had been poured. She looked at the drinks, liquid spilling over the top of the rim from Rose’s exuberance. She looked over at the leftover cake, where the remaining icing called out ‘ULATIONS!’ and finally, Pam Beesly burst out into tears.

It took about fifteen minutes for Pam to collect herself, sitting on the couch and letting out huge sobs of frustration, interspersed with tiny sips of her drink. She quickly recounted the rest of her day to Rose, who said nothing, but curled up on the couch next to her and occasionally patted her on the shoulder.

The tears had almost all dried by the time she was relaying how Elizabeth the stripper had offered to teach her the basics of pole dancing in exchange for a cut of her first few jobs, and how Ben Franklin had left his phone number under her windshield wiper with a note saying “I’d love to see you in my pantaloons…”

At that, Rose stopped trying to keep in her laughter and let out a giant giggle. “Ah well done! Now we can both look into profitable stripping careers. I’ve already been mistaken for a stripper twice in my life, and one of those times was on a planet where I was two feet taller than the dominant life form, and short an appendage.” Pam tried to frown but the mental image was rather silly and her glass was empty, so she let out a giant snort of laughter instead.

“And Ben Franklin!” gasped Rose. “Wasn’t he one of your presidents or something? You could have made it with an American legend!”

“No!” cried Pam, swatting at Rose. “But he did discover electricity! And try to make the wild turkey America’s national bird. And rack up an impressive number of sexually transmitted diseases. Though,” she added thoughtfully, “he did have some pretty good hair. What was left of it at least? Enough to hold on to. I think.”

Rose snorted daiquiri out her nose and the two girls dissolved into giggles all over again.

“Thank you.” Pam said, once she had caught her breath. “Seriously it’s weird that I don’t know you, I can’t actually think about it all for too long. But you did this for me,” Pam gestured at her empty glass and the space on the couch between them “and I needed it. And you knew.” Rose shrugged and smiled a little too brightly.

“Ah.” Pam said with the beginnings of a frown. “Spoilers? Seriously, again?”

Rose let out a puff of air and moved to get up, lightly patting Pam on the arm. “Let’s just say, I had a suspicion that you might need a bit of cheer tonight.” And with that, she grabbed Pam’s empty glass and disappeared into the kitchen, where Pam could soon hear the blender hard at work again.

***

“What is this anyway?” Pam asked, dipping her finger right into the glass.

“Strawberry daiquiris!”

Pam looked at Rose expectantly.

“What?” shrugged Rose, “I don’t like bananas.”

***

“And then I finally figured out why he was trying to keep me from a mirror. My entire skin had turned fluorescent purple. ‘M talking blimey you can see me in the dark purple. It took three weeks for the residual effects to wear off.”

“What’d you do?”

“Well he felt so badly about not warning me about the tree bark that he took me to this giant disco on the third moon of Keldon, during the decade that body paint was all the rage? Yea, so no one batted an eyelash and he even let me paint his face bright green. Well, that’s to say I painted his face a lovely shade of green and he moped only a little bit. Oh, I got quite tanked off Keldon tequila and he got all silly trying to keep me from flashing my knickers and we ended up stealing a strobe light for the library. I wonder if it’s still there.”

“I’m pretty sure you are insane.”

***

“How did you pay for the rum anyway? There’s no way there was rum in the house.”

“Mmm, it was a little less than ethical, but almost mostly legal.”

“You really are a stripper.”

“Ah, you’ve found me out! Don’t tell Dwight. Now, do you have any of those twisty straws? This would better with a straw.”

***

“If you won’t tell me your name, what am I supposed to call you?”

“Um, how about Carly. A friend use to call me Carlos, as a joke. That might work.”

“Why can’t you just tell me your name?”

Rose shrugged and drained her glass in one gulp. “I guess I have to keep something for myself. So much gets lost in the shuffle.” She accidentally let out a loud belch and looked so horrified that both girls toppled over laughing yet again.

***

“Baked beans on pizza? You can’t be serious.”

“It’s delicious!! I promise. It’s the best.”

“Well, even if it was, there is no way the pizza place here has that. We are in Scranton.”

“Fine. What do you usually get?”

“Pepperoni and pineapple?”

“With olives?”

“Olives on half.”

“Agreed. But chips too! Can we do a side of chips? What about chips on the pizza?”

“I’m taking your drink away.”

“How ‘bout you just take a shot of rum and catch up?”

“How about I do a shot of dacquiri instead?”

“Two shots.”

“Deal.”

***

“So we would just put a different colored stapler on his desk everyday and it actually took him a full week to notice. But everyone swore his stapler had always been bright red and really, what could he do about it. So then we decided to start leaving him notes on his desk, written out in staples. From the basic ‘I like your hair today.’ to the 'I can kill a man with a paper clip.' We ended with the elaborate ‘I’ve lost my sister. Stanley is doing terrible things to her. Help us all!’ Dwight made a big show of thinking it was some kind of stupid joke but Stanley caught him later, mid rescue attempt, and he had his stapler privileges revoked for a week. I ended up having to staple things for him, which sucked, but it was totally worth it to watch him ninja into Stanley’s locked drawer, armed with his bright red stapler and a pair of pliers. Dwight keeps his stapler all locked up now, but every now and then I like to leave a handful of loose staples scattered around his desk. Just to keep him guessing”

“Nooooo! I never saw that one!”

“…You are such a spoiler tease.”

***

“Why exactly are you going through my closet?”

Rose emerged victoriously, brandishing a dusty box with something feathery dangling out of one end.

“Those are dance costumes from the jazz classes I took when I was 15.”

“And? I don’t care what they’re from. They are still in your closet, ya? I just suspect they might be better than this terrible shite you’ve been wearing, And, sparkly! Try this on. Oh and this as well.”

***

“I’m not wearing blue eyeshadow.”

“Nope, you are not. It is eyeliner and I’d say it’s more of a greenish blue.”

“Oww! That’s my eye.”

“Well stop squirming all about, you.”

“Stop poking out my eye!”

“Well I don’t want to miss any good bits. Here, you can do your own mascara. Not like that! Put your elbow into it. Better.”

***

“Pam, I cannot believe you have 5ive on your mp3 player.”

“Shut up.”

“No, it’s great! I loved 5ive! Baby when the lights go out, every single word cannot express… You are going to have to sing with me. I get terrible stage fright. Like that time on Eleneck! Oh...”

“No, I am not singing 5ive in my living room at 8pm at night.”

“Pam, you’re wearing a dance costume and a feather boa. So drink up and if you are very nice to me, I will even teach you the choreography from the music video.”

“Oh, you think I don’t know it. That’s so cute.”

“Show off.”

***

“So wait, how old are you?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Don’t know which years count anymore.”

“Right. Of course.”

“No really! ‘M not trying to be difficult. I really dunno how to count. If you had asked me in 2005, I would have said 19. But then I spent almost three years with him, and then almost five years in the other world. So I think I’m closer to 27, though right now I guess I’m about 21.”

Pam frowned for a moment, deep in thought. “It’s like being born on a leap year! Well happy birthday then? Happy birthday!! For all your birthdays in between!”

They clinked their glasses with a big smile, and Pam gifted Rose her feather boa.

***

“I’m not going to the store dressed like this.”

“Pam, we are out of rum. And I can’t go alone.”

“Well at least let me change!”

“But that is the whole point! C’mon! We’ll tell them we are long separated sisters, celebrating our reunion. If it’s a bunch of blokes, they love that stuff! You can be named, hmm Sophie. And I will be Lila.”

“The store is three blocks away. They kind of know me there.”

“Not with that eyeshadow they don’t.”

***

“Do’ya think Karen’s more attract, attrast, Do you think Karen’s prettier than me?’

“Of course not! She’s fine but she’s just something different, all her different bits. Don’t go and forget that, right? I know these things. She’s very lovely, but she’s not you.”

“She’s really nice too. If I were a guy? I’d totally want to do her.”

“Well, all I can think about is shagging Ben Franklin now. I blame all that talk about his great hair, I think.”

“I love hair. Karen has pretty nice hair.”

“Pam. Your hair is nice too.”

“Thanks. I think your hair would be better if it were a little less blonde. Oww! Careful! That’s my drink!”

***

“What are you going to do if he shows up?”

“When he shows up. He’ll find me.”

Pam sighed as she attempted to pull off her old tap shoes. “It’s so romantic. That’ll be a big kiss. Movie ending.”

Rose blushed. “Er, well we’ve never really, I mean we have, but not really. We weren’t really like that, not exactly.”

Pam aimed for the couch but ended up plopped on the floor, jaw dropped open. Very slowly she spoke, “You’re searching, across universes, for a guy, that left you, on a beach, in Norway. And you’ve never really kissed him?”

Rose smirked. “Well as you should know, sometimes, you don’t need all that to still know all that, right? Sometimes you just know, and you just have to hope it will all work out, that everything that’s supposed to happen will.”

“He told me he loved me and I walked away.”

“I told him I loved him and he faded away. The best things are worth going back.”

“Wow. You are very wise.”

“Nope. Just rather trusting. And hopeful. And drunker than you.”

“Perseverance!!!! Yes!! I’ll persevere Karen’s face off.”

“Hmm, or maybe I’m less drunk. Hard to say. It might be time for sleep now.”

“I’m sorry I made fun of your hair. You are very nice.”

***

The next morning found Pam passed out in her bed, still dressed in a leotard, with one tap shoe on and about two weeks worth of smudgy black eye makeup on her white pillowcase. A full glass of water and a bottle of pills had been set next to her bed, along with several sheets of looseleaf paper covered in messy scribble and sketched pictures.

Rose emerged from the bathroom, fully dressed in one of Pam’s skirts and stockings, though paired with her own pink top and leather coat. Her hair was pulled back in a simple bun and her eye make-up was out in full force. “Hope you don’t mind. How do I look? Temp-tastic?”

Pam groaned and buried her head deeper into the pillow.

“Get up, get up! Remember our plan?” Rose gestured to the pile of papers on Pam’s bedside table. “Those are the items I need to build the radiated transfigmorater.”

“The what?”

“I know! I just made it up. It sounds very serious and important, no?”

And that was how day two of Rose Tyler’s infiltration into Pam Beesly’s life began.

8 hours later, the Doctor would arrive in Scranton.

***