A/N: Had to follow up the "Money" call-back in "Secretary's Day," obviously. And don't think that "six weeks" comment got by this girl! This is one of two parts. Second should be up tomorrow or Monday.
Disclaimer: Nothing's mine!
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I'm not sure how I feel about today. I missed seeing adults other than Jim all the time, but being back here quickly reminds me that there's a shortage on true adults that I work with.
But, still. Even if a picture is the closest thing I have to Cece right now, Jim's right next to me. So now we can mope and miss her together a little, I think. I'm trying to put this order in with the same hands that usually hold my baby all day, and it's too distracting to see them empty. All day.
Jim is good at keeping me occupied. We start doing impressions throughout the day (the one he does of Stanley when we're alone together in the kitchen is my favorite) and I count myself lucky for getting to work with my husband and best friend. Things aren't going to be so bad adjusting if he's at work with me, you know? Plus, he's an old pro, because he really only had less than a week off after the baby was born.
We make sure to thoroughly roll our eyes at each other once we get our suspension notices. Gabe even writes notes to us explaining the details of our consequences. I click my tongue and look up at Jim, who's fully grinning.
"Really?" he mouths at me, eyes pinched. "He couldn't even type this?"
I giggle and fold it in half, holding it over the trash for show, eyebrow raised over at him.
Jim nods, like it's common sense. "Yes. Obviously. I wonder if this is even part of his job. What does he even do here?"
I shrug with big eyes and reach for the phone (impressing myself with the instant memory of Toby's extension), when I hear a sniffle from behind me. My hand is on the receiver when I turn slightly, seeing Erin's bowed head.
Jim notices, too, and frowns in her direction. Sometimes, I think I can figure out what to say to someone. Maybe her, and maybe this time. I look around for anything I can fax, and have to spend a few seconds finishing a paragraph I left a while ago, and carry the sheet up to the desk.
I try my best to explain it to Erin, end up saying something very Hallmark to the effect of "sometimes you don't know what you're looking for until you find what you're looking for" (I forget the words quickly afterward) and it goes over her head completely. Endearingly so, though, I suppose. As I nod and start back to my seat, I remember that it's only been years since I've been behind that desk in something close to her situation. Kind of. Maybe not really at all. But it's familiar, that pain in that chair, and I walk the distance to the desk I used to only watch, instead.
I bend down, my hand light on his shoulder, and kiss his temple. My nose rests against him, my senses full of that shampoo I bought him last week ("Pam, this is, like, the most manly-smelling shampoo ever; I'm not hot enough to use this."), and my skin tingles. My mind buzzes with how much I simply love him, all the time; how patient he is with me, how much he loves our daughter, how much he wants everything to work for us all the time, how good he is to people, how much he makes me laugh --
Jim quirks a smile at me, and I feel full and a little ridiculous, because maybe just a sales report is in his head while mine, effectively, explodes with love for this wonderful guy. I smile back at him and reach for the phone again. Just four more hours, unless I'm really getting suspended.
Which, Toby confirms, can't be the case. It's not completely relief though, moreso amusing that poor Gabe is putting on the muscles suit like this. I hang up the phone and catch the picture of my pretty little girl in the pink frame next to my dead plant and sigh. I glance at the camera (old habits die hard) and grab a piece of scratch paper.
As it sits on my knee, I scribble, "Let's get suspended" and hand it over to Jim. He looks like he approves. We're out the door with our coats and bags, pretty pleased with ourselves, in a matter of minutes with Gabe right behind us.
He smiles at the road ahead of him as we leave the parking lot, and I replay the words I said to Erin again in my head. The weight of them shocks me, how much things have worked out in my own life, and how much Jim and I are so lucky to have. It scares me, stops my heart for a beat, when I think of how one decision anywhere could've broken this. I reach for his hand, almost without my knowing. The smile doesn't leave his face when he turns to look at me, kissing my knuckles loudly, enough to make me laugh.
"You know what we should do?" he asks, flicking the turning signal.
"Hmm?" I hum lightly, distracted my the slope of his chin. It fits right below his smile, that warm smile that walked into the office one day and changed everything about everything.
"We should go pick up the baby and go home and make mac 'n cheese with hot dogs." He says this so animatedly, that I almost get tears in my eyes. Which is... stupid, maybe, but the way he's never changing? The way he's always going to be my buddy, and goofy, and adorable, and sincere? Even if we're tired or covered in spit-up or suspended from work with or without pay? I love him.
"What?" I laugh as we come to a red light. We're about five minutes away from the daycare when it comes to me.
I really miss him.
He shrugs and thumps his hand against his thigh. "I don't know. That's all I used to eat. It's awesome."
I place my hand next to his on his thigh. It's coming to me faster than I can keep up with, and all of these sudden movements are something I haven't done in a while, and keep my mind fuzzy and ineffective.
Apparently, it isn't obvious to him. He keeps talking about meals he had when he was fifteen and I contemplate my next move. I'm going for really obvious here.
When he comes to a crucial intersection I point at the right lane. "Let's go home quick."
He does a double-take. "What? You mean, before we get the baby?"
I nod furiously, because this is increasingly awkward all of a sudden. I hate when things spring up like this. He's made it more than clear that he's willing to wait, it's all my call, which means I, basically, have to spell it out for him if I want anything close to what I really, really want right now and, wait -- does this make me a bad mom? Because I'm asking him to sideline picking up our child for this --
"Wait, for what?" he seems puzzled as we stay in the middle lane.
"We need to do something real quick," is the only thing I got, and I pray to God he doesn't say "Do what?" so I won't have to say "Me" or something terrible like that.
"Do what?" Damn it!
I take his hand. He still doesn't get it. "Just... I'll show you when we get home."
He's so confused, and I feel so bad, but I can't bring myself to say, "Let's go home and have the sex we've been waiting for for months." I was way too uncomfortable for most of my third trimester to do anything like that, and we've been medically disallowed to do anything after she was born (not that I was feeling up to it anyway), and Jim, my poor husband, patient as a saint --
"For what?" he says, as he gets into the right lane. "Oh! I picked up the phone bill, I was just going to call it in over the phone, babe." He smiles and checks his blind spot to get back into the middle lane.
This sucks. "No, no, that's not what I meant. Stay in this lane. Go home quick." This is weird. But, oh, I'm so glad he remembered that phone bill. I always forget. He's so sweet.
"I love you," I say quietly, thoroughly born of the phone bill reminder.
"I love you, too," he says with a laugh. "Now what are we doing? This is the most cryptic detour, ever."
We're close enough to our street that I start to get antsy. I know once I start things, Jim will take the reigns and I won't have to feel so awkward and creeped out by my own desire to fuck my husband. Like it's so weird that I want to do that. Now, I can get this thought across in my head and still I can't just... Ugh.
I just dive in. Kind of. For the most part.
I wrap one palm softly around the side of his neck that's facing away from me, and reach up to kiss his cheek. I strain against the seatbelt, my breasts pressed against him and he turns to kiss me quickly on the lips.
He smiles at me, but keeps driving. I unbuckle the seatbelt and let it slide across and away from me, before I rest my hand on his thigh, and let it fall lower when my lips touch the skin on his neck.
He feels warm, suddenly, or maybe it's just my lips feeling hot themselves. He turns towards me when the car stops in our driveway, and his lips meet mine. It's slower, softer, warmer. It works, still.
"What are you doing?" His voice is low, like I hear it every morning.
I blush and raise my eyebrows.
"Really?" he asks, his voice jumping an octave. I'm a terrible wife. He asks this like it's glass he could break and lose it all, like it's been centuries since we've had sex. By the way I'm squirming against him now, it's possible that's the case.
I nod and he nods and we start kissing again, and it feels like a date we had a really long time ago, when we ended up making out in his car for a good half an hour. His hands are in my hair, pulling the elastic out of my ponytail. I let him take the reigns, just like I wished and knew he would, when he runs his fingers through my hair and rests his palms on the backs of my shoulders.
"Pam," he breathes against my lips.
"Let's go inside," I say, interrupting him, snaking my hand downward again.
"Yeah," he whispers, sexy and tentative as he keeps kissing me. We break, maybe a little self-consciously, as he detangle ourselves and get out of the car. I reach back into the car for my purse, but he pulls on my hand and backs me against the car to kiss me some more. The baby weight I still have starts to make me feel big and extra in places I don't want to feel that way, and it's probably affecting my performance... But, all I want is him over me, on me, and inside, that I start pushing him towards the front door before I can think.
We don't even make it up to the bedroom, which is good because I don't know we'd attempt stairs at this point. Our kissing keeps making these noises I haven't heard in so long, and it's just that and breathing, and the fabric of our clothes against each other. My mind is a highway of these noises and our pulses and the heat I have in places he needs to touch. I wrap my arm around his neck as he collapse onto the couch and we remove our clothes faster than we ever have before, I'm sure (faster than our first time, faster than that time we almost did it in the park, faster than that time that we had no furniture when we first moved in...).
We're practically naked, except for our underwear and my shirt. He starts to push my shirt up, to feel more of my skin, but I stop him. If there's anywhere I don't feel sexy right now, it's my stomach. It's never going to look the same as it used to, as my mother has reminded me almost grimly, for the past few months.
I push on his wrists and kiss him harder. He pushes back.
"No, Jim," I say, holding my shirt down firmly.
His hair is crazy. I love it. "I'm not going to --" His chest is heaving as he nods at my breasts, which he knows are off limits. "I just want to..." He swallows and ducks his head, pushing the shirt up again.
"Jim," I plead, but he wins and my stomach is bare. I squeeze my eyes shut tight and feel his lips all over me.
"I think you're beautiful," he says quietly, murmured against me there. It's a whisper and so delicate, like a reminder. A just-so-you-know. I think I want to believe him instead of feeling like a whale, which I do for most of the day anyway, so I let myself have that.
"I love you," I say again, because it's the theme today. He stops and searches my eyes, then crawls up to kiss me slowly, changing our tempo for a moment to savor this. Our lips slide and run over each other and I feel his hands on my hips and it's all over.
"I love you," he says, quickly, and is pushing down my panties and his boxers before either of us can consider doing anything else.
I groan when I pull his hips into mine, and he pushes into me. He makes a loud noise, pleased and worn, and breathes loudly against my neck. I grab onto him and make him move, my body's too wired and excited for his skin this close to mine to take any pauses. We start rising to meet each other, and it still, still works. I don't have to be a bad wife, I can still do this. And for whatever kind of wife I think I am, I think Jim loves me too much to care that I made him wait eons for sex.
My head is void of any real thoughts for quite some time, as his body meets mine over and over again, that sweet ache born of so many days and hours finally being satisfied. I have a beautiful baby girl because of him, and this home that I love, and God, he pays the phone bill for me...
He bends down to kiss the tip of my nose, which happens with a loud noise that makes us both laugh breathlessly. I can tell he's getting closer because he looks more concentrated and kisses me a lot, starts moving harder.
There's a small part of me that wonders if it feels different for him. Penny would say something stupid to me when I was pregnant, like, "Aren't you afraid it's going to be... you know, different down there? All stretched out?" I would hit her at about the time when she would mimic shouting up into a cave and hearing an echo. Only slightly mortifying, that one.
He still wants me, right? This is still good for him, right?
He's warm and deliciously damp in my arms when he pushes up into me hard. Together we hold our breaths and close our eyes, foreheads together, touching everywhere intimately until all the air comes out of his lungs and he lowers his whole body onto mine. I bite my lip, wondering how much of us changed and how much of us stayed the same. He leaves a trail of kisses, light and soft and wonderful and full of love, up from my jaw to my eyes and rests his face into my neck again.
Our breathing slows, and I remember what it's like to hold sleeping, exhausted Jim in my arms, gloriously naked. Only this time, things feel a little different. Maybe a lot has changed, more than I would really know. Maybe he's just too nice to tell me.
The clock above the fireplace tells me it's only one, and if it's anything like it is when she's here, Cece should be halfway through a nap. I stroke his back as I try to fall asleep. It's more like waiting for Jim to wake up, though.
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Part two features a super cute baby that I'm going to fabricate, mostly, and her parents being very talented at putting her to bed.
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© 2006-2023 More Than That | Skin created by Kali
© 2006-2023 More Than That | Skin created by Kali