“When did this happen?” Her mother’s voice is loud in her ear, pushing through the haze that has settled around her.

“About ten minutes ago.” She can barely breathe, barely speak. All she can feel is the phone cord as she tangles it between her fingers. The desk beneath her. The cool, regulated air against her bare arms.

“Did you tell him no? That you’re engaged?” She wants to tell her mother to keep her voice down, to keep that dirty, tainted word to herself.

“No, I didn’t know what to say.” And she still doesn’t. Still doesn’t quite know what just happened.

“Surely he knows nothing can happen. Darling, you’ve been engaged for three years.”

And her mother’s voice is gentle but it almost feels like an accusation. “Yes, I know.” She is mumbling like a child. Like she has done something wrong. And she knows she hasn’t and yet the gnawing of guilt persists at the base of her stomach.

“Is there are a part of you that maybe wanted to say yes?” She called her mother for a reason, but now she almost regrets it. Almost regrets the completely nonchalant way in which her mother is picking at the truth, attempting to peek into the depths she herself won’t even go. Even through the phone, her mother can see the pieces of her daughter that she cannot admit to herself.

“Um, I don’t know, Mum. He’s my best friend.” And she tells herself that this one simple truth is all she needs to admit tonight. Because he is her best friend, but now the thought of something more lingers in her periphery, tugs at the haze she is comfortably ignorant behind.

“I’ve seen how you two get along. He’s a good guy.”

She snatches at this truth, too. Maybe if she says two true things she can avoid saying a third. “Yeah, he’s great.”

There’s a silence at the end of the line. Her mother takes a breath. Her stomach flips. “Are you in love with him, Pammy?”

And she stares at the wall in front of her and fights through the haze for just long enough to say the third truth. Before she can regret it, take it back, deny it. “Yeah, I think I am.”

But now there is a shadow moving near the door and she can hear the carpet disturbed by footsteps and then he is moving into the dimly lit office space that she thought she had to herself. “Um, I have to go.” She can her mother saying something, attempting a kind of goodbye, and she throws a response down the phone. “I will.”

And now there is nothing to protect her, to stall her, to save her from being brave, and he is walking towards her and she knows she should saying something but she has no idea what.

“Listen, Jim.” It is pathetic and meaningless but she enjoys the way his name feels on her tongue. And she thinks she has time to formulate a complete sentence because he hasn’t said anything but now his arms are around her waist and she is against his chest and he is kissing her. For a moment she doesn’t know what to do with her hands but suddenly the only place they need to be is against his cheeks and she is leaning in to him. She is overwhelmed by the smell of him, by his cologne and the scent of the warehouse and him. She can taste alcohol on his lips, knows he can taste it on hers. And for just a moment she lets the haze surround them both, envelop them in wilful ignorance. But then she remembers that these smells are not Roy’s, that this hair and skin under her hands are entirely unfamiliar even though she could draw them from memory. And now her hands are on his chest and she is pulling away and he is leaning in for one last kiss and she lets him even though she knows she shouldn’t.

He takes her hands, doesn’t let her retreat. And despite it all, he is smiling and she cannot help but return it. “You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that.” His voice is low and warm and his words are just for her. The guilt melts into the haze and for a moment she is free.

“Me too.” The truth feels strange on her tongue, a weight she is not used to. “I think we’re just drunk.” And maybe she is, because she has never felt so clear-headed.

“No, I’m not drunk.” His smile disappears into his words and he takes in her face. She lets his gaze wash over her for a moment, tries to memorise what his eyes look like this close. “Are you drunk?”

“No.” It feels so good to be honest. Almost as good as it feels to be standing like this, breathing him in and feeling his hands on hers, his skin on her skin. She wonders how long the smell of him will linger on her dress. He is moving closer, leaning down to kiss her again. And she wants him to, and she doesn’t want him to, and she knows that she shouldn’t and suddenly the haze is gone and her head is full of Roy and she stops him.

“Jim.” She blinks, looks down. Avoids his eyes because she knows what she will see in them.

“You’re really going to marry him?” And when he says it like that, she knows she is doing something wrong, but she is back in her old skin and her body is responding without her. She meets his eyes, nods, stays silent. Focuses on his fingers against her hands. Wonders if he will argue.

“Okay.” He steps back, doesn’t let her go. Stays there for a moment, runs his thumb across her skin. And then her arms are by her sides and her hands are cold and naked without him and she is alone. Alone with the dark and the regulated air and the feeling that maybe she’s made a mistake. She takes a breath and it is shaky. Her hands are shaking. She leans against his desk, folds her arms across her chest. Feels her nose tingle with the threat of tears. Closes her eyes against them.

Her fingers find their way to her engagement ring in just the same way they have done so many times before. She traces the outline, feels its familiar angles beneath her fingertips. And not for the first time, she thinks that this dainty ring represents a shackle more than it represents an eternal commitment to love and loyalty.

She wonders why it is so hard for her to be happy these days. She wonders why it takes her so long to fall asleep, and when she does she tosses around dreams of the office and Jell-O and Jim. She wonders why it has been so easy for her to ignore the swelling of her heart that makes it feel like her chest is going to explode. She wonders why her skin comes alive for Jim but never for Roy. And she wonders why it was so easy for her to nod and push him away, when she knows she should have just pulled him back in and let herself drown in him forever.

She pushes herself away from his desk, away from him. Takes the stairs down to the parking lot, into the cold and the night and the place where things should be normal. She has settled so deeply into herself that she doesn’t quite know what she is doing until she finds Jan leaning against her car, a burning cigarette in her hand.

“Jan?” She throws her voice across the parking lot, and Jan turns around in a flurry. “I thought you’d already left.”

A smile breaks across Jan’s face, but it is bitter and sarcastic and self-deprecating. “I’d planned to, but...” She shakes her head, taps her cigarette twice, watches the ash fall at her feet. “Let’s just say this whole night was a mistake.”

“I’m glad I found you, actually.” She ploughs through that last statement, afraid of what it might make her say or do or think or feel, and leans against Jan’s car. She can feel her heartbeat in her ears. “I was wondering if now is a good time to talk?”

“As good a time as any, Pam.” Jan isn’t even looking at her. She takes a long pull from her cigarette, blows out a stream of smoke in the most defeated way Pam has ever seen. One arm is tucked around her stomach while her other elbow balances on top, her cigarette dangling from burgundy nails. Pam notices how strange this executive woman looks out of her normal pencil skirt and button-up shirt. She is different, standing here smoking in jeans and a jacket. She thinks that maybe her boss is coming undone right here, just as she is herself.

“I want a transfer.” Her voice is steady but she can feel the strength leaving her legs. She focuses on the way the cool body of the car drips through her dress and settles at her hip, supporting her, keeping her upright. “I don’t care where. Just put me anywhere there’s an opening.” She doesn’t stop to think. Just says the words as they come to her.

Jan turns, just her head, and really looks at her for the first time. “Where is this coming from? I thought you were happy here, Pam. Settled.”

“I need a change.”

“A change is a new pair of shoes, a new desk chair, a different clock to stare at until 5pm.” She thinks that Jan is trying to talk her out of it. Wonders if she will dig her heels in or collapse into the habit of whatever is easy. “Are you sure, Pam? All our other branches are out of state.”

“Yes.” And she nods to enhance the effect. She holds Jan’s eyes, and for a moment she fears that her boss will turn her down. But then there is a smile tugging politely at the corner of her mouth and she takes another drag from her cigarette.

“Okay.” She nods, too. Her smile widens. “I’ve got an opening at the Stamford branch, but it’s sales. Is that the kind of change you’re looking for?”

“I guess it is.” And she wonders why Jan even offered her a sales position at all.

“Let me talk to Josh, and I’ll get back to you on Monday.” Jan offers her hand, shakes Pam’s firmly. “I’m impressed, Pam. And not a little surprised.”

“Me too.”

“I know Scranton will miss you. You’ve been here for a while, haven’t you?” She turns to lean her back against her car. Tilts her head up to look through the clouds to the few stars visible tonight.

Pam turns to the glass doors through which she has walked so many times it pains her to count. On the other side it is dark but she can easily conjure the elevator doors, the stairwell to the right, Hank at his desk and the cheap fluorescent lights. She wonders if she has it in her to miss Scranton back.

“Four years.” She sees them like a weight around her ankle.

“Aren’t you engaged?” Jan suddenly turns back to her. “Will he come with you? I’m not sure if I have room for another warehouse guy in Stamford.”

She pauses for just a moment. Considers Roy and the way in which he occupies most of the space in her life. Considers what it would be like to not be continually crowded out of her own engagement, made to fit the expectations of a man who told people they were merely dating. “No, he won’t come with me.”

“Long distance?” Jan makes a sound, and to Pam it sounds like the dying gasps of a drowning woman. “Good luck.”

“Thanks, Jan.” And she means it. But Jan nods once, and Pam knows it is time to go.

For a small, insane moment, she considers venturing back inside the warehouse, getting as intoxicated as she has ever been in her life, and stumbling into a cab at some anonymous morning hour. But Stamford is a big enough risk for the rest of her life, and she settles for calling a cab while it is not yet tomorrow and driving home in silence. The back seat feels as big as the conference room with no-one to share it with and she stretches her hand into the space, noting the way empty air feels on her skin. She can smell the stale, recirculated air and the remains of an undesirable air freshener, but all she can feel is the seat beneath her and the satin of her dress against her back. She is alone. She wonders if this is the feeling she will never get tired of. Doesn’t stop to think if she is making the right decision.

She shoves her key into the lock of her front door and remembers that she doesn’t like to call this place her home. Pushes the door open into the cool darkness of the living room. Feels her way to the second door on the right. Leans against the doorframe for a moment.

This is her room, their room, the place she has spent the last six years of her life. Even through the darkness she can find the dresser on the right, stacked high with sketchbooks and cologne and spare barrettes and a hairbrush. She can see the socks and pants and underwear strewn across the floor. She can see the laundry basket she deliberately placed in the corner and has only recently refused to fill on her own. She can see the doors of their wardrobe, of the space where her life of work and not much else is laid out for her every morning. It leers at her now, sneering at her attempts at formal wear and beckoning her back into the life of pencil skirts and heels, the life she has known for so long and wants so desperately to leave. She can see the two bedside tables on either side of their bed, his empty and hers covered in pencils and another sketchbook and a tiny alarm clock. And she can their bed, and the mess he has made of it. If she tries hard enough she can imagine she sees his silhouette contorted beneath a mound of sheets and blankets, piled against his legs while her side is cold and naked.

She slips out of her shoes, out of the satin that she wishes still smelled like Jim. Pulls on the pyjamas she left underneath her pillow this morning, the same as every morning, and sits on the edge of the bed. She can hear Roy snoring, his breathing even and deep. She wonders for a moment if she is brave enough to last the night here, to lie in this bed and pretend that she has not just shed the skin she has been living in for four years, to hide her new, courageous self beneath the trappings of banality. She grips the edge of the mattress, takes in the sensation of sheets against her palms. Thinks that maybe this is one of the last times she ever has to do this. Thinks that maybe she can start to imagine a different life beyond this bedroom. Allows herself a smile.

She is not comfortable in this bed. She stares at the ceiling and sees shapes that twist and change and shift in front of her. She feels the echoes of fire on her waist, tastes the wisp of alcohol left on her mouth. And instead of closing her eyes, she wonders how long it will take before these sensations fade into memory.