"Jim, can I ask you a question?"

Mouth quirking into his habitual grin, he stood gamely and crossed to the reception desk. Leaning against it, he plucked a few jellybeans from the jar she put out every morning. "Oh man. I really wish you could, Pam." He popped one into his mouth. "But you just officially exceeded your daily quota with that one."

Her lips curved readily as she snatched the jar and stowed it in a drawer. "What a coincidence."

He raised his eyebrows at her. "Okay, you win," he conceded playfully. "What's up?"

“If you insist." She giggled, returning the jar to its original location. She still couldn't get over how lucky she'd been to get this job assignment. Being a receptionist was her first ever desk job, and she loved it. Until a couple weeks ago, she'd been a waitress at the Glider Diner. For years, she'd gone home at the end of every night with too little money and too much back pain. No matter how friendly she was, people never seemed to tip well. She'd always had a flair for customer service, though, and finally the kitchen manager had recommended her for a promotion. She'd never have to work more than forty hours a week here. She didn't have to worry about ketchup splatters or soda spills anymore. And, most importantly, the pay bump had been respectable. She was still waiting on her first paycheck, but she wouldn't have to rely on tips now that she was making an actual salary.

"I do. Go," he said encouragingly.

"It's about something you said today," she continued with an earnest smile. "I'm wondering if it's a term that's specific to the paper industry, because I've never heard it before." Jim had been so helpful in getting her acclimated here at Dunder Mifflin. Way more helpful than her actual boss. Michael was more interested in hiding in his office than answering her questions about the fax machine or the phone system. "Something called 'free dumb.' What's it mean?" She'd never heard those two words used together until today, and she couldn't make sense of it.

He gripped the counter convulsively and gaped at her. Flabbergasted, he was temporarily unable to maintain the calm facade that had always served him well. He looked around frantically, checking for cameras, finding none in view. Thank god. In a low, hushed voice, he asked her urgently, "When did you hear me say that word?" That facade was the reason he'd been assigned to work as a paper salesman and not a soldier, like so many of his high school classmates, too many of whom had died before getting the chance to live.

He looks awfully worried all of a sudden, she thought curiously. She wasn't sure why. It wasn't an inspection day. They had almost an entire year before job reassignments were due. What else was there to worry about? "It's not one word, it's two words," she insisted at normal volume. She knew that free meant zero cost, everyone knew that. Like when a customer bought nine reams of paper and got the tenth for free. And she knew that dumb meant not smart, of course. "Free. Dumb," she repeated.  "I just can't figure--"

"Shut up." He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her a little. "You can never, ever say that out loud again," he said with an uncharacteristically intense look on his face, a sharp edge in his voice. I'm looking at a dead woman, he thought wildly, feeling like his heart might break because she didn't even know it. She was so sweet and so innocent. And so fucking dead.

Her eyes widened. Her lip quivered. Jim had never been mean to her before. She'd thought they were friends, maybe. Almost. Well on the way, at least. She hadn't actually thought he was capable of anger. He was perpetually kind and funny, no matter how obnoxious Michael or Dwight got… no matter how insufferably holier-than-thou Angela became… no matter whether he made five sales in a day or zero. He was consistently calm and laid-back, and the only person she'd ever met that she could honestly have said that about.

Until now. He looked… he looked scared. And that scared her. Terrified her, because he was normally so unshakable. "But you said it out loud," she pointed out honestly, her voice quavering a little. "When you talked to David Wallace this morn--"

He clapped his hand over her mouth. "How did you hear that?" he muttered fiercely.

"Sorry, I'm sorry!" she said, tears springing to her eyes, her words muffled by his hand.

Suddenly, he realized what he was doing. He dropped his hand as though she were hot lava. Guilt crushed him as the corners of her lips twitched down in a series of convulsive frowns, like tears were imminent. His conscience hammered the point home. Your fault, asshole. This is YOUR fault.

"I didn't mean to. I transferred him to your desk the same way I always do… I dunno, maybe I accidentally made it a three-way call." She shrugged helplessly. "I kept hitting the transfer button but it wouldn't drop me off the line. I hung up as soon as I could, but I heard you say free dumb first and--"

"Damn it!" he hissed, cutting her off, thinking shit. Shit. SHIT! Scrubbing both hands over his face, he figured it was more likely the shitty phone system being its typical shitty self than anything she did wrong, because she was the first receptionist he could recall who was actually good at what she did. But just… why fuck SHIT. He leaned in close and spoke precisely, quickly, quietly. "Listen to me, Pam. Freedom is one word. And if you get caught saying it out loud, your next job reassignment will be in the gulag. Do you understand?" She was a fucking dead woman and it was his fucking fault, and now he was probably fucking dead too. He needed to talk to David yesterday, to try to figure out how to fix this. To figure out whether it even could be fixed at this point. Because if not, he would have some very difficult decisions to make.

She shook her head, a single tear sliding down her cheek. "What are you talking about? What's the goo log?"

He closed his eyes, marshaling every scrap of patience within himself. He didn't know whether he could fix this, but he knew he needed to try. He knew that his anger and his fear were only succeeding in scaring her, so he tamped down both emotions. "They will send you to a work camp,” he stated plainly, but not unkindly.

She blanched, obviously understanding that.

He pulled out several tissues and handed them to her, continuing in the same tone of voice. "Go to the bathroom. Avoid the cameras. Stay there until you stop crying. If anyone asks you why you're there, pretend that you accidentally ate some expired yogurt for lunch and it made you sick. Forget that you ever heard that word. And forget that we ever had this conversation. Can you do that?"

"I don't know, Jim," she said honestly, dabbing away her tears. "Lying is illegal."

He paled. "If you can't, they'll send me to a work camp," he told her grimly.

She gasped, covering her mouth. She liked Jim, more than any other guy she'd ever met. Not that she'd met all that many, and not that it really mattered how she felt about him. Like everyone, she’d be getting a marriage assignment at some point. But she really… really didn't want to get him sent to a work camp. She'd thought they were maybe almost friends, before this anyway. She wasn't so sure now, with how unlike himself he was currently acting. He was being weird, which made her feel weird. Still, she liked him enough that maybe she could lie about this if he needed her to.

Maybe.

She wasn't sure, she'd never lied about anything this big before. But she was sure he wouldn't ask if it weren't incredibly important, so… "I won't say anything to anyone," she promised, crossing her heart with her index finger. "I swear."

His brow knit and he closed his eyes. Suddenly, she thought, he looked like he was going to cry. "Hurry up," was all he said. She jumped up and headed for the bathroom as he bade her, feeling all kinds of weird, worried in a way she'd never been worried before.

He forcibly schooled his expression before returning to his desk. He picked up his phone and dialed David's extension. David was up high enough that calls to and from his work line were never monitored, so he only needed to worry about observation on his end. Fortunately Dwight was on patrol, Phyllis was an ally, and nobody else was within earshot.

"Freedom First," he said without preamble in a low voice. "The new receptionist heard me say that this morning. I dunno what the hell to do."

"You let yourself be overheard?" What wasn't said, merely heavily implied, was Are you an idiot?

"She got stuck on the phone. The system messed up. She hung up right after."

"Are you sure that's all she heard?"

"Yes." He didn't know her all that well, but he knew enough to be sure that she hadn't lied to him. Had quite possibly never lied to anyone. He also knew her well enough to know he liked her, not that it mattered because he was too heavily involved with this. And this was bigger than himself or his feelings. 

He heard David's heavy sigh on the other end of the line. "What do you think we should do?"

There wasn't time for the Socratic bullshit right now, so he cut to the chase. "If I knew the answer to that question, would I be asking you?"

"You know what I'm going to suggest."

He had a pretty good idea. David had the power to force an unscheduled job reassignment. He could send Pam back to her old job, he could even send her to a work camp if there was reason to think she would betray them. Jim wasn't totally sure why he cared so much, but he did. And he couldn't let either of those things happen. “She's really good at the job. She actually seems happy.”

“How is that relevant?”

Jim held back a sigh with effort. “You asked me what I think we should do. I don't know. But I don't think you should get rid of her.”

“Is this personal?” he asked pointedly.

“No,” Jim denied flatly, lying through his teeth. He was grateful that he'd learned to become a very good liar over the past couple of years, because he could tell by David's response that he believed him.

"Any signs at all that she might be… amenable?"

"She crossed her heart and swore she wouldn't say anything."

There was a pregnant pause. "That could easily be a coincidence."

"I know that, damn it. But you asked if there were any signs and that's the only thing that comes to mind. And... I think she's trustworthy.”

"Would you stake your life on it?" he wanted to know.

Jim thought hard.

"How about hers?" he continued.

He spotted a cameraman approaching through the kitchen window. "Yes. That'll be fifteen reams, Mister Freeman, you got it. Anything else I can do for you today?"

"You've got one day to take care of it, or I will. You know what to do. Be in touch."

"Will do. Have a nice day," Jim replied, smiling blandly as he hung up. He recorded the sale in a dummy spreadsheet he used for just such occasions, mind racing, feeling utterly unprepared for what he'd just gotten himself into.

-- 

Pam's mind raced frantically as she drove home from work. She'd wanted to talk to Jim privately, to continue their conversation. Unfortunately, there hadn't been a chance between the cameras, Dwight's proximity, and the way Jim had uncharacteristically avoided her all afternoon. She felt a lot more suspicious of the cameras than she ever had before, because now she had a secret. A big one. She'd never had to keep a secret this big before. It was especially bad because she didn't really even know what it meant. She had to find out what freedumb was and what was so bad about it. Most of all, she had to know why he was saying it at the office. If it was so bad it could get him sent to a work camp, why would he risk that? And what on Earth did David have to do with everything?

She wished she had his phone number. Although, she reflected, phone calls were subject to government monitoring, so that wouldn't even really be helpful. This wasn't a conversation that could be had anywhere but in person. Although fortunately, as sophisticated and ever-present as the public surveillance methods had gotten, they hadn't gone so far as to record people inside their own homes. She swallowed hard because, even as law-abidingly honest and polite as she was by nature, she'd been wondering for awhile if that was inevitable. Because she wasn't really sure she'd be okay with that. Not that a waitress--oops. Receptionist, she corrected herself. Not that a receptionist had any power to change things like politics, but it felt… just, it wasn't right. The older she got, the more she'd started feeling that something wasn't right. A grown woman working more than full-time hours shouldn't have to choose between putting gas in her car and eating lunch for a week. She had scraped her expenses down to the bone, she lived in the cheapest apartment she could find, but she still barely had enough to get by.

She was just walking through her front door when her phone announced an incoming text message. She pulled it out of her pocket, figuring it was her sister. Penny had recently gotten her first job assignment, working nights as a hotel maid, and she was usually waking up about now.

Hi Pam. This is Jim. Have you eaten yet?

Her heart galloped in her chest. She hadn't given him her number. Not that she wouldn't have, but he'd never asked. Texts were monitored the same way phone calls were, though, so she was careful not to give anything away.

Hi Jim. Not yet. Have you?

Not yet. Would you like to meet up at Casa Bella?

She bit her lip. Of course she'd like to go to Casa Bella. Even though there would be cameras, so they probably wouldn't be able to discuss freedumb--whatever it was--she'd been there once with her father and it was amazing. With this job, she actually would be able to go out to eat every once in awhile. But she'd depleted her bank account buying a few necessary pieces of business casual clothes, and she was still waiting on that paycheck, so…

I'd love to, but I'm a little strapped. Thanks, but I'll just make something at home. Maybe after payday?

Jim sighed. Of course, she wouldn't have gotten her first paycheck yet. He needed to see her tonight, but he hadn't even thought about that. Money wasn't an issue for him, for various reasons, but it was an uphill battle for most people these days. And he couldn't pay for dinner for an unrelated woman at a dine-in restaurant without a marriage assignment. He might get away with it once, maybe even a few times, but things like that had a way of getting noticed. And he was nothing if not cautious.

He texted her back, wheels turning feverishly in his mind.

Absolutely. I'll talk to you tomorrow?

Yes, talk to you tomorrow.

She made a bowl of corn flakes and turned on her small television. More for the background noise than because there was anything she particularly wanted to watch. She flopped down with a sigh on her threadbare secondhand couch, dreaming wistfully of fettuccine alfredo and wishing she weren't so dang broke.