The hospital cafeteria was much as Pam remembered from the couple of meals she’d grabbed here when her mom was in for her surgery, except that they’d added a small Starbucks-like coffee shop in the front vestibule. She almost grabbed a twenty-ounce fancy coffee from there to make up for sleeping in the chair in Jim’s room, but noticed they had a chai latte and opted for the lesser caffeine but better taste of tea instead. She hesitated about food options before the basic grill in the corner caught her eye and she found herself ordering two grilled cheese sandwiches in honor of Jim. She met back up with Larissa at the unified checkout and they sat together. Larissa had a pile of something spicy on her plate from the Chinese food stall with a side of rice, along with a Mountain Dew. She quirked an eyebrow at Pam’s spread.
“I see you and my brother have similar tastes in food too.”
“Um…yes?”
“Don’t worry, Pam, I’m just teasing. Jim was always the traditionalist in the family. I,” and here she took a big bite of whatever-it-was “actually like flavor in my food.”
Pam giggled and took a bite of her sandwich. “Hey, there’s flavor in a good grilled cheese.”
“Maybe in a good one, but my brother’s…”
“Jim makes very good grilled cheese.” She blushed.
“Oh my god that’s right, I forgot. He totally made you grilled cheese that one time on the roof.”
Pam blushed harder. Did he tell Larissa everything?
“Anyway, I don’t think that was a normal grilled cheese for him. He probably, like, actually put something on it besides plain white bread and a slice of American. Maybe for you he even discovered, like, butter or mayo or something.”
Pam nodded. The grilled cheese had been nothing fancy, but it had certainly been a little more involved what Larissa was describing.
“Yeah, well, you should feel special. I’ve eaten with Jim tons of times and he’s usually pretty lazy about what goes into that grilled cheese. Then again, I’m just his sister.”
Pam felt the need to defend Jim’s honor, even if she wasn’t entirely sure it was under attack. “He said it was famous, so I think he’s made it before.”
“Maybe so, but I’m gonna go out on a limb and say he upped his game for you.”
Pam hoped so. But then again, how had she responded to this upped-game sandwich? By shooting Jim down the next day when he’d joked about it being their first date. Of course, she was engaged then, so he deserved the put-down, but she could have been nicer about it, especially since he was apparently pulling out all the stops for her—and she wasn’t minding it one bit, except when he reminded her it was happening. She took a sip of chai to calm her nerves.
Larissa put down her fork. “So, Pam, what exactly are your intentions towards my brother?”
Pam spit out her chai. “Um…what?”
Larissa was laughing, and it reminded her so much of Jim’s laugh—a glorious sound that Pam hadn’t heard since Casino Night—that it almost hurt. The hot tea she’d just spit on herself did hurt. But she couldn’t quite keep an angry face as Larissa giggled out “I’m sorry, I just couldn’t resist. I’ve always loved those old movies where the dour old man asks our hero that about his beautiful daughter.”
“It’s OK. Um…I think my intentions depend on Jim’s? Like, you saw the sketch, and um…”
“Pam.” Larissa put a hand on Pam’s. “I saw the sketch. I also know my brother. I don’t think you need to have any worries there. I wouldn’t have let you stay with him if I had any. So what I’m really asking is…are you ready? I know you just got out of a long relationship, and I don’t want to pressure you to be with Jim if you’re not really ready to, just because he got into an accident.”
“No, no, I…I’m in love with Jim. I’m ready. I just…it’s hard to say something like ‘we’re going to date’ when, you know, I haven’t actually talked to him in a month and he’s sitting upstairs in the ICU.”
“I understand. And don’t think I’d be joking around with you if the doctors hadn’t basically convinced me he’s going to pull through. The comparison between today and the first night I was here…Pam, it was horrible. This is so much better, and I just…I’m sure he’s going to be OK. And Pam?”
“Yes?”
“Once he is OK, you really don’t need to worry if you’re going to go on a date, assuming you’re ready. I think we’re going to have to slow that boy down from proposing to you, if anything.”
Pam stammered. “I…”
“I did say we’d slow him down, right? Don’t worry, he wouldn’t put you on the spot like that. But yeah, he’s head over heels. Before I met you, I’d have said it was sad.”
“And now?” Pam wasn’t sure she wanted to hear it but the words came out without conscious thought.
“Now I’m not sure I should be slowing him down at all.”
Pam blushed again. It was beginning to be a habit with her, she realized, one she should probably tone down especially if she was going to be seeing a lot of Jim anytime soon. But then she realized she didn’t have to tone it down anymore. She wasn’t engaged. She wasn’t married, thank god. She was free to blush at Larissa, or Jim, or anyone she wanted, because she could actually do something about it. And it was Jim. Jim who had said he was in love with her—who had told Larissa an embarrassing number of stories about her—who Larissa was sure still loved her. And whom she was rapidly beginning to realize she had been in love with for a lot longer than she’d let herself know. She smiled at Larissa over the cafeteria table.
“I think you should slow him down, because I did just break up with my fiancée. And besides, I think this time maybe I’d like to do the proposing myself.”
This time it was Larissa who had to do the spit-take.
