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Author's Chapter Notes:
Introducing some future conflict here.

It’s been three weeks since he first met Pam, and Jim literally hasn’t stopped thinking about her since then. Still, he figures, there are worse things he could be preoccupied with than honey curls and flushed cheeks and carefree laughter.


Yep, he can admit it to himself—Jim Halpert has a big, fat crush on Pam Beesly.


He texts her 24/7 like a loser, but maybe not so much like a loser because she also replies to him 24/7. Or, he thinks adoringly, maybe she’s also a loser. Whether that’s the case or not, Pam might be the fastest friend he’s ever made, and in only a few weeks she’s become his closest friend as well, at least on campus. It’s just a bonus that she’s funny and smart and pretty and generally amazing.


They meet for lunch a lot, basically whenever their schedules match up. Today happens to be one of those days, and he’s just as excited as he always is. He’s already waiting at their usual table in student dining, his plate occupied by half a ham sandwich, an apple, and a bag of French onion chips. He doesn’t like French onion much, but he knows Pam loves them that way, so he always buys a bag just in case she’s still hungry after she finishes her own meal.


He only waits a few more minutes before she slides into the chair across from him, placing her plate on the table and tucking her hair behind her ears. She looks cute. It’s late October at this point, so she’s been dressing in a lot of sweaters and scarves, and today is no exception.


“Hi,” she says, not looking at him, and he frowns.


“You look kinda flustered there, Beesly,” he says. “Everything okay?”


“Yeah, great,” she says with an unconvincing nod.


He narrows his eyes at her. They both know she can’t put anything by him, so at this point it’s just a matter of her stubbornness. And his own, he supposes, as he plans on staring at her until she cracks.


It doesn’t take long before she sighs and picks up her fork, jabbing it into a piece of lettuce and resting her head on her other hand. “I don’t know,” she says. “It’s probably nothing, but…” she looks up at him, almost for reassurance, and he nods for her to continue. “Roy reached out to me this morning.”


Jim tenses at Roy’s name. That’s the one reason why he hasn’t tried to make any real moves on Pam. Her relationship may be deteriorating, and they may be coming up on two months for their break, but it’s still a relationship nonetheless. He’s tried to get as much dirt on Roy as possible, whether it be from Pam or Kelly or whoever. Based on his research, he’s been able to deduce that Roy Anderson is an asshole who does not deserve Pam Beesly.


“What, uh…” he clears his throat, taking a sip from his grape soda. “What did he want?”


He thinks he knows exactly what Roy wanted. He just wants to hear it from Pam.


She shrugs. “To talk, I guess.”


“Like, in person?”


Pam laughs humorlessly, shaking her head. “Yeah. I mean, we talked on the phone initially, but then he asked me to come home. Can you believe that? Like, I’m not driving three hours just to talk to him in person.”


Jim likes that answer, but something in her eyes makes him frown. “You want to, though.”


“I don’t know what I want, Jim,” Pam admits. “He… Roy is all I’ve known. We grew up together, we’ve been dating for years. But he’s just… he’s so different now, you know? He’s not going to school for anything, and knowing him, he probably just sits around all day doing nothing. He’s not who he used to be.”


Damn. Jim thinks this might be the most she’s opened up to him about her relationship. Usually it’s just short answers and avoidance. “Do you—”


“Jim, he told me that he wants to marry me!”


Okay. That’s enough for Jim to choke on his soda. “He told you what?” he asks incredulously. He’s sure his eyebrows have raised comically high, his eyes bugging out of his head.


Pam nods rapidly, eyes also wide. Her fork and entire lunch have now been abandoned as she lets her head fall into her hands. Jim thinks for a moment that she may be crying, but she meets his gaze and looks more angry than anything else. “He told me that he wants to marry me,” she repeats, almost like she needs to hear it again herself.


“Does he know that you guys are—”


“Eighteen years old? Hours away from each other? On a break?” Pam finishes for him. “Clearly he doesn’t. I mean, I always pictured myself marrying him, but those were like, little girl dreams. He’s the only boyfriend I’ve ever had, so who else would I imagine?”


Selfishly, Jim feels like a weight has been lifted from his chest. So she doesn’t want to marry Roy. That’s good, right?


“He just needs to give you space,” Jim says, hoping it’s the right thing. He doesn’t have much experience with relationships himself, especially longterm ones, as his only girlfriend was Katy from summer camp in tenth grade. It lasted three months.


Pam shakes her head. “That’s the problem, Jim.” Okay, so it wasn’t the right thing to say. Whoops. “We’ve been giving each other space for almost two months now. And while I was here trying to see if I could maybe… I don’t know, move on, he’s been at home thinking about how he wants to marry me someday.”


“So you feel… guilty?” he asks slowly, trying to decipher what she’s saying.


“I… I guess,” she says. “I don’t know, just more confused than anything else right now.”


He nods, not wanting to pry any farther. But… there’s one thing he wants to know. Almost needs to know. He wrestles with even asking it to begin with, but before he can stop himself he’s already blurting it out anyway. “Do you still love him?”


Her eyes snap up to his, and she looks almost panicked at his question before it’s replaced with defeat. “I… I think so. And I think I always will.” Jim tries not to let his shoulders drop at that statement, but then she speaks up again. “But… I don’t know if I love him the way I used to. The way I’m supposed to.” As if ashamed by her words, she casts her gaze down to the untouched salad on her plate.


He doesn’t really know what to say to that. Should he be reassured that she’s losing feelings for her slob of a boyfriend? Or should he be concerned that she might not be losing anything at all? Then he realizes that he’s being a complete, selfish idiot. God, he’s worried more about his own stance with Pam than he is her emotional state. What kind of friend does that make him?


Clearing his throat, he reaches across the table and taps her hand twice with his index finger. “Hey,” he says, waiting until she slowly brings her eyes to meet his before continuing. “Let’s just not think about this right now, okay? We still have to finish eating, and I even got you something.” He holds up the bag of French onion chips and watches as Pam’s eyes brighten, a smile slowly breaking out across her face.


“You’re the best, you know that?” she says, reaching for the bag and tearing into it. He’s proud of himself in this moment, for being able to comfort her like this, even if it’s only for a little while.


“You could tell me more often,” he quips, and she kicks him lightly under the table.


Still, the smile doesn’t leave her face, and he takes that as a win for today.


---


He’s walking her back to her dorm when Pam speaks up about something that Jim has been absolutely dreading.


“Are you going to the Halloween party on Friday?”


Apparently it’s an annual thing, and it’s also all Dwight’s been talking about since he met Angela Martin, a sophomore. Supposedly she’s on the dorm’s party planning committee or something. Jim’s never met her, but if she’s friends with Dwight, he’s not sure he wants to.


“Uh, I don’t really know, to be honest,” he says, scratching awkwardly at the back of his neck. “I heard that costumes are required and I’m really not into that.”


Pam’s jaw drops. “Jim Halpert, you buzzkill!”


“What? I just don’t like dressing up!”


“Did you even have a childhood?”


“Yes, Pam, and wearing a costume was very fun when I was ten.”


Pam makes a weird nose, something between a scoff and a snort, and bumps into his side playfully. “How can I get you to go?”


The funny thing is, I’m already planning on going now that I know you want me to, he wants to say, but he figures that might be overstepping, so he settles for, “I don’t know, Beesly, I’m not sure if you can convince me here.”


“Oh, Jim, come on,” she pleads, grasping his arm and tugging on it a few times to emphasize. He probably shouldn’t enjoy it as much as he does. “You have to go! You’re like my best friend here and it’ll be my first college party and I don’t want to be stuck with Kelly all night, especially since she’s probably just going to be in a dark corner with Ryan the whole time!”


“You’ve got a pretty good argument, there,” he says. He’s very aware of the fact that she’s still holding onto his arm, and it’s making it kind of difficult to focus. Her eyes, large and pleading, are also no help. Ugh, he’s such a sucker. “Okay, okay, fine,” he says with an overdramatic sigh. “I guess I’ll go to the Halloween party.”


“Yes!” Pam releases his arm to pump each of her own into the air.


“But don’t expect an elaborate costume,” he warns, smile betraying his tone. “I told you I’m not into that stuff, and just going to this party should be enough for you.”


“Trust me, it’s more than enough,” she tells him. “Actually, I—”


She’s cut off by a shrill ringtone, and reaches into her back pocket for her phone. She glances at the caller ID and frowns, and Jim thinks he knows who it is. Pam, however, simply shakes her head and declines the call, slipping the device back into her pocket.


“Was that Roy?” he asks.


“Who else would it be?” she asks, and her voice is monotonous. Any semblance of previous humor and joviality is replaced by frustration and deflation. “I didn’t exactly hang up on a good note earlier.”


“You could’ve answered it, you know.” But I’m glad you didn’t.


“I know,” Pam shrugs, “but you’re the one who decided I shouldn’t think about this whole situation right now, so that’s what I’m doing. Not thinking.”


They walk the rest of the way to her room in moderate silence. Pam unlocks the door and pushes it open, then turns to Jim and smiles. “Thanks for today,” she says. “I know I probably talked your ear off with my pointless relationship drama, but I really appreciated you listening. You’re much better than Kelly.”


“Is Kelly even capable of listening?” Jim quips. “I thought her only setting was talk.”


Pam laughs. “You’re so mean.”


They bid each other farewell after that, and Jim shuffles to the elevator with his hands in his pockets. He’s worried about her, with the whole Roy situation. From what he’s observed, it’s not a healthy relationship. It seems to be held together by string, duct tape, and obligation.


At least, that’s what he tells his suitemates at eleven thirty after a fair helping of alcohol from Andy’s hidden stash. All four of them are a little bit beyond tipsy—even Dwight, who swore on their first day that he would not “partake in foolish college rites of passage, like underage drinking or getting high in the dormitories”—and Jim is feeling his sense of restraint slowly slipping away.


“Dude, you just met this chick,” Ryan says, leaning his head back against the wall from his spot on the floor. “Like, yeah she’s pretty hot, but you barely even know her.”


“She’s not just hot,” Jim insists, frowning. “She’s warm and she’s funny and she laughs at my jokes, unlike Dwight.” He points his bottle accusingly in the direction of the aforementioned.


“That’s because your jokes are not funny, Jim.”


“True. They’re hilarious.”


“Okay, okay, here’s what you have to do,” Andy, the most drunk of them all, says. He groans as he slides across the floor toward Jim. “You… you gotta just tell her that stupid Ray is a stupid dumbass, and that you should be banging her instead. Girls love honesty.”


Jim frowns. He’s not going to tell Pam to her face that he wants to… bang her. Ugh, the word itself just feels wrong. But maybe he should suggest breaking up with Roy for good. He knows that she’s at least thought about it, and hearing it from someone else might help her to actually do it. And then Jim could start dating her instead, and make her forget about Roy completely because he would treat Pam so good.


“Guys, should I just call her now?”


“Yes,” Andy says loudly.


“No. No way,” says Ryan, furiously shaking his head. “Absolutely not.”


“It would be a terrible idea, especially in your current state,” Dwight says in his typical, flat voice. “As much as I would love to see you embarrass yourself, I also like Pam well enough to consider her a slight acquaintance. Do not confuse her more than she clearly already is.”


“Ugh, it’s just so hard, you guys!” Jim says, this time practically shouting.


“That’s what she said!” comes a voice from the other side of the door. All four of them turn to look at each other.


“Michael,” says Ryan, panic flashing in his eyes. Jim knows that the panic, however, is not due to the prospect of being caught drinking against the rules, but because their senior RA has rather pathetically attached himself to Ryan. “He’s literally waiting outside the door. He’s gotta be.”


“We should invite him in,” says Dwight, ever the kiss-up, as he moves to stand up. Immediately, three pairs of arms are reaching for him in protest.


“Dwight, no!”


---


One thankfully Michael-free hour later, they’ve all retreated into each of the two-person rooms. Jim can hear Dwight snoring in the twin bed across the room from his.


His mind is racing, thoughts now much more sober than they were earlier. It’s not his fault that he’s developed this crush on Pam. Some things you just can’t control, right? He only wishes it was easier. He wishes she wasn’t in this stupid hot-cold relationship, that she could give him a more obvious sign that she may be interested in him, just anything.


He sighs, placing a hand over is eyes. If he’s only known her for three weeks and already feels this way, then what’ll it be like in three months?


He’s not sure he wants to know.


Chapter End Notes:
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