She drove slowly, talking to her mother about Roy, her unhappiness, and what she could do now. Her mother’s attitude was warm and comforting, and she felt guilty for being surprised. She’d anticipated a fight, or at least some pushback against the idea that she’d just walked out on her fiancé of three years a month before their wedding date. She’d been with Roy for ten years, after all, and her parents were accustomed to calling him “son.” But her mother had been nothing but caring and concerned about how she was doing, and whether she needed any help, and Pam wasn’t entirely sure but she had almost sounded relieved.
In fact, if she didn’t know better (and she was beginning to doubt she did) she’d have thought that her mother started holding her breath as soon as she started with “it’s about Roy” and had let out a big whoosh of relief when she’d said “I left him.” Certainly the conversation had moved much more quickly than she’d anticipated from “what happened” to “what are you going to do?” and there had been not a single touch of recrimination along the way.
But then again, it had been her mother she’d reached out to last night, to tell her what Jim had said, and it was her mother who’d asked that fateful question, “are you sorry you told him he misinterpreted things,” to which she could only respond “Yeah, I think I am.” Her mom wasn’t stupid. Even she could tell that the next question was “are you in love with him” and the answer was probably the same—and she didn’t need to have actually asked the question, or to have been in the room while Pam and Jim kissed, to know that didn’t spell good things for her relationship with Roy.
Actually, now that she thought about it, her mom had been awfully silent on the topic of Jim the whole time. In addition to pushback on the speed and abruptness with which she’d abandoned a ten-year relationship, she’d expected at least a few probing questions about what she was going to do about Jim. Was this about him? Was this a rebound? Was she going crazy? She’d even had answers ready. Yes (but only because he’d made her realize her life could be more than it was now). No (a rebound implied she was broken up about Roy, but she oddly wasn’t; she was done, but not so emotionally exhausted that she was glomming onto the first man she found just because he was there). And no (at least she didn’t think so).
At the moment, however, she was beginning to doubt that last answer, because her aimless driving (she’d needed to get out of the house with her stuff, but with her mom as far away as she was she hadn’t actually decided to drive out there, so she’d just been tooling around Scranton talking) had led her, consciously or unconsciously, to the house Jim shared with Mark. And now she was worried that she was, in fact, going crazy. Because there was a moving van parked in front of the house, and someone who looked awfully like Jim shoving boxes into the back.
A young woman she didn’t precisely recognize but assumed must be Jim’s sister from the basic principles of family resemblance was holding the door open while Mark and an older Halpert-adjacent male who must logically be Jim’s father manhandled the couch down the front steps. Unconsciously echoing last night’s conversation, she muttered “I have to go” and hung up the call with her mother as she parked the car across the street. Mark glanced up from the couch, shouted something, and Jim turned towards her just as she jumped out of the car.
“What are you doing here?”
She didn’t know what she’d expected Jim to say, but somehow that was not it. She ground to a halt halfway across the street and stared at the tableau, speechless, while his eyes skimmed down from her face. She could see the moment he fully registered that she was still in the same periwinkle dress from last night, because something darkened in his eyes. Not moving his gaze off of her, he waved absently in the direction of the team behind him while reaching back and rubbing his neck with the other hand.
“Take five, everyone.”
The woman was busily muttering something to the older man as Mark herded them all into the house, absurdly leaving the couch wedged halfway down the front steps. She hugged her arms around herself. Jim couldn’t really be leaving, could he? What was going on?
That seemed as good a place as any to start.
“What’s going on, Jim?”
The best description she could come up with was that he tried to smile. The motions were all there, but something about it was slightly off, like one of those uncanny valley AIs you see in the not-quite top-tier videogames.
“I asked first.”
She nodded. He had asked first, and she probably did owe him something like an explanation for why she was here. The only problem was that she didn’t really have one, or at least not one she was willing to articulate here. What was she supposed to say, “I was wandering and apparently I can’t do anything without thinking about you, so I ended up here?”
On second thought, what else was she going to say? “I don’t know?”
Apparently two was too many thoughts, because her mouth betrayed her before she could actually decide on a strategy. It opened, seemingly of its own accord, and the only really pertinent information in the world tumbled out.
“I broke up with Roy.”
His reaction confirmed, if she had needed any confirmation, that she’d made the right decision.
“Are you OK?” He started to walk towards her at her nod and then stopped on the edge of the pavement. “Actually, Beesly, I’d feel a lot more comfortable with that answer if you’d get out of the middle of the street.”
She smiled at him (there was something she hadn’t done since about 9pm last night) and finished crossing the street, coming to rest next to him, staring up. When had he gotten so tall? Some insane part of her imagined that it had all happened last night: she’d never really noticed quite how tall or lanky he was—or not let herself notice—until he told her he was in love with her. It was like he’d grown six inches with those words, and it made him just that much more delectable.
Oh god, she was standing here ogling him. Time to get back into the conversation. What there was of it, because apparently something had distracted him too. He shook himself free of whatever it was and answered her smile with something that looked a lot more like one of his own than his previous attempt.
“Thank you, Beesly. I’d hate to see you take such a momentous step only to get hit by a car here on the mean streets of Scranton.”
She looked around at the utterly deserted street. “Yes, I feel much safer now.” And she did, but not because she was standing on the sidewalk.
He peered down at her, a crease of anxiety folding into his face. “You sure you’re OK?”
She wanted to reach out and flatten his forehead, but she didn’t because that wasn’t where they were right now. “I was.”
“You were?” The crease was a divot now, and he reached out to grab her arm. “Did he do something to you?”
She almost laughed, except that she knew that wasn’t an appropriate reaction right now. “No, no. But, um...Jim?”
“Yes?”
“You still haven’t answered me. What the hell” she relished the effect her obscenity had on him “is going on?”
He followed her glance towards the moving van as if noticing it for the first time as he let go of her arm. She missed his touch immediately. But she couldn’t focus on that; the answer to her question was too important.
“Oh...um...” he was back to rubbing his neck again. “I may have sort of taken a transfer. To Stamford.”
“Connecticut?” It was a stupid thing to say, but it was all that she could process in that moment. Jim was leaving? “When did this happen?”
“Last night.” He sat down on the curb heavily and she was amazed at the reversal of position that now had her towering over him. “Jan offered me the transfer and after I...after you left I told her I’d take it.”
She didn’t like having this conversation at different levels, so she sat down carefully next to him. “Don’t transfers take a while to process?”
He didn’t meet her eyes. “I’d kind of been bugging her about it for a while.”
“How long?” He didn’t answer. “How long, Jim?”
“Since the Booze Cruise.”
Of course. She felt like an idiot, and not for the first time. It was another confirmation, if she’d needed one (which she didn’t) that she was right to have left Roy. She’d never thought back to that night without regrets, mostly that she’d let a drunken Roy overwhelm all the doubts she’d been having even then with a seemingly randomly chosen date and a microphone. Now she had a more concrete regret to go with the others. But now she also had the chance to do something about it, she realized. She leaned her head on his shoulder.
“I never should have let him set that date.”
His shoulder jumped, but otherwise he gave no indication he’d heard her.
“Can you ever forgive me?”
“For what, Pam?” His voice was soft, as if speaking at a normal voice would frighten her off and make her fly away from his shoulder like a butterfly.
“For letting myself stay with him.”
“No.” She tried to jerk up in surprise, only to find that his hand had somehow snaked around her to hold her in place. “I can’t forgive you for that, Pam, because there’s nothing to forgive.” She settled back into place, letting the warmth of his embrace flow through her.
“Then can you forgive me for how I’ve treated you? Especially last night.” She nestled into his chest. “You never misinterpreted anything.”
Later, she would swear she could feel the smile start in his chest and travel up until it reached his face, even though she wasn’t looking up. “That, I can do.”
