After a few mishaps and an awkward incident with a caterer, Mark’s wedding finally happened and Jim acted as best man. The ceremony was nice (and thankfully short) but Jim couldn’t help feel a little depressed throughout the whole thing. Something was still missing in his life, and it didn’t matter how many times he reread Pam’s letters or looked at her picture. He was still having a hard time trying to piece everything together. The writing classes he enrolled in were helpful, but they turned out to be more painful than he anticipated because all of his main characters turned out to be thinly veiled caricatures of Pam. He wondered when he’d get over feeling this way.

During the wedding reception, he spent a lot of time by the bar with some of his and Mark’s old college buddies. They rehashed memories and talked about what they had been doing with themselves. None of it was particularly interesting, but Jim was grateful for the distraction.

Mark joined them, smiling brightly. He clapped Jim on the shoulder and said, “How are we doing here?”

“Brad was just reminding us about that time you got drunk and streaked across campus,” Jim replied, smiling.

Mark laughed and shook his head. “No, that definitely wasn’t me. In fact, I don’t remember such a thing happening. Certainly a young and responsible guy like me would never do something like that.”

The rest of the guys laughed loudly.

“Campus safety chased you in a golf cart!” Brad said.

“Nope, must’ve been some other guy,” Mark said and winked. “Hey, Jim, can I ask you something?”

Jim nodded. “Sure, what?”

Mark motioned for Jim to follow him and led him a few feet away from the bar. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m doing good,” Jim said. “Why?”

“Well, you’ve been pretty bummed lately,” Mark said. “I mean, you’re still upset about that girl, are you?”

“Anne?” Jim said. “No. That was over months ago.”

“Okay, good,” Mark said, “because if you were still hung up on her, I might feel bad about the favor I’m going to ask you.”

Jim looked at him skeptically and Mark continued, “Okay, so, one of Janette’s friends from work is here and since nobody else from the office showed up, she doesn’t really have anyone to talk to, and she’s a really nice girl, so we were hoping you would -”

“Mark, I don’t know,” Jim interrupted. “I’m sure she’s really nice, but I’m just not -”

“I didn’t say you had to get married,” Mark said. “Just talk to her. That’s all I want. I would have asked one of the other guys, but... well, you know how they are. Come on. I promise it’s not going to kill you.”

Jim sighed. “Fine.”

Mark grinned. “Okay, great. I’m going to send her over to the bar.”

Jim nodded and Mark walked off. When Jim walked back to the bar, he saw that his friends had wandered over to the dance floor to make fools of themselves. He smirked and shook his head then turned back around to the bartender. “Can I get another beer?”

After a few minutes, Jim heard a voice behind him. “Um, excuse me? Are you Jim?”

“Yeah,” Jim said and turned around. “Hi. You must be -”

When Jim saw the woman who Mark had sent over, he forgot how to speak. He wasn’t even sure that he could remember how to breathe.

“Pam,” she said. She put out her hand. “Pam Worley. Nice to meet you.”

“Worley. Right.” Jim nodded dumbly and shook her hand. “Y-Yeah. Like-Likewise.”

“Mark didn’t mention how articulate you were,” Pam said and smiled.

Jim closed his eyes and laughed. He took a deep breath and opened his eyes. She was still there, so he hoped it wasn’t a dream.

“Uh, yeah,” he said. “I guess I used up my vocabulary during the toast.”

“It was a good toast,” she said. She moved to stand next to him and leaned against the bar.

“Thanks,” Jim replied. “So, you work with Janette?”

“Yeah,” Pam said. “I’m in the art department.”

Jim smiled. “That’s good. I mean, that seems interesting.”

“I like it,” she said. She watched people dance for a moment, then turned to Jim and said, “Please don’t feel obligated that you have to make small talk with me. I know Janette just felt bad that there weren’t more people here from work that I could talk to.”

“Not at all,” Jim assured her.

“Okay,” Pam said. “But if I get annoying or you decide you hate me, feel free to just, like, walk away or whatever.”

“Oh, I’m not walking away from this,” Jim said. He blushed and added, “This conversation, I mean.”

The corner of Pam’s mouth quirked up. “Right. Well, what do you do, Jim?”

“I sell paper,” Jim replied. “It’s even more boring than it sounds. I die of boredom at least five times a day.”

“Hmm,” Pam said. “Maybe you need someone to rescue you.”

Jim smiled and met her gaze. “I definitely do.”

Pam grinned and looked down at the floor. After a moment, she looked back up at him, “And what do you do when you’re not selling paper or dying of boredom?”

“Well, I started taking some writing classes,” he told her. “These days I spend most of my free time writing.”

“Really? That’s pretty cool,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to hang out at a wedding reception with a writer.”

Jim drew a checkmark in the air with his index finger. “Well, cross that one off your list.”

Pam laughed and tucked a stray hair behind her ear. “Yeah, I guess I can.” She paused then asked, “This might sound weird, but... have we ever met before? Ever since we’ve been talking I’ve felt like I know you from somewhere.”

“No,” Jim answered, smiling softly. “We’ve never met.”

Pam nodded then turned to look at the dance floor. She smiled widely and pointed to Mark, who was dancing wildly out of sync with the music. “Wow, look at him go.”

Jim turned to see what she was looking at. “Wow. But I won’t criticize Mark’s dancing because he really did me a favor here.”

He turned back to Pam and smiled.

Pam raised her eyebrows. “Oh, really?”

“Absolutely,” Jim said, nodding. He offered her his hand and said, “Do you want to dance?”

Pam smiled and took his hand. “Absolutely.”

While they danced, Jim grinned and said, “Wow. You are... such a dorky dancer.”

“You must be mistaken,” Pam said and winked at him. “I’m the cat’s meow, don’t ya know.”

Jim smiled softly.

He had never believed in magic... until now.