Disclaimer: I don't own The Office. Sadfaces galore.
Author's note: This is set the evening of The Negotiation, the episode that Roy tries to punch Jim's lights out. My twist is that Jim broke up with Karen right afterward. Enjoy!
Make it Right
It's seven o'clock when Pam finally stops crying and bucks up from the couch as if someone has jolted her back from the dead. All at once she is restless, unable to sit still, unable to waste one more second of her life fretting over what could or should have been.
I'm sure you guys'll find your way back to one another someday.
She's crossing the room like the floor is burning her feet, swinging the door open so it makes a satisfying thud against the wall. How dare he? How dare Jim think so little of her?
Through her fury she manages to strip down and find her mostly untouched workout clothes. She fumbles with the laces to her sneakers, her fingers shaking. It's the sort of adrenaline rush she hasn't felt in years—it's nonsense, it's brewing inside her like storm, it needs to be released.
She clambers down the stairs, too jittery to wait for the elevator. It occurs to her that she's left the door unlocked, but it seems too trivial to break her stride. It's as if there are rocks on her chest, weighing her down, and every step she takes is lessening the burden, allowing her to breathe a breath that is wholly and entirely her own.
When she reaches the lobby she sees her scowling landlady and smiles back at her like a madwoman. Her step into the cold evening air is the most liberating one she's ever took.
She hits the pavement and tears away from her apartment building, and for the first time in her life she doesn't have the thought of Jim Halpert nipping at her heels.
It's eight o'clock when Jim puts down the phone and heaves a sigh, feeling terrible for the instantaneous relief that comes after breaking it off with Karen. He's just spent forty-five minutes on the phone with her, hearing her out, assuring her that it was nothing on her part and that it didn't have anything to do with Pam.
Of course, as he sits down on the couch, blinking wearily at the blank television screen, he knows that it has everything to do with Pam. The way her eyes crinkled with hurt as they spoke in the break room, and the distance between them that he'd ignored all these months suddenly exaggerated beyond repair with the simple words, "Jim . . . I really am sorry."
In that moment he could no longer ignore what was plain in front of him—that she was falling apart.
Until then he imagined her as separate, having nothing to do with him now that they had both established that they were apart. It was easier that way. He didn't have to worry about her or wonder if he'd hurt her, wonder if he played a part in the canceled wedding, wonder if he ruined a good thing for her by provoking Roy into his fury by kissing Pam all those months ago.
Jim . . . I really am sorry.
He knew that she wasn't talking about Roy busting in when she said that. No, it was so much more. The bad timing, the exhaustion of chasing each other in circles, the crush of endless, futile pursuit. Every disappointment they'd ever faced was expressed in those few words.
She had been looking for his reassurance, and he just brushed her off, walked away as if he were too engaged with his soda to care.
After a few painstaking minutes it's too much to think about, like he's bitten off more than he can chew. He shakes his head, shakes the thought of Pam's lonely eyes, and turns on the television.
The images on the screen pass by unimportantly. He is detached from the brutal scene on the television, the firefighters spurting water at a doomed building roaring with flames, until he hears the faint words of the reporter saying, "The city of Scranton has never seen a fire of such proportions …"
Willing to distract himself from his thoughts, he turns up the volume to listen closer. "The source of the fire is unknown, but the police are categorizing it as suspected arson judging by the spread of the—"
The camera pans closer to the scene and then it's as if Jim is in a bubble, blocking out all of his senses. He recognizes that building. He would have recognized it right away if it hadn't been so out of context.
He grapples for his cell phone, delirious with panic, shoving the buttons with fingers that are too thick to obey.
"Reports are claiming that it is impossible to tell if the building has been fully evacuated, as the building's twelve floors is home to over three hundred residents," the voice on the screen says, and he blocks it out, jamming a finger in the ear that isn't attached the to cell phone speaker.
It rings once. It rings a second time, and Jim feels the sweat breaking out uncontrollably. It rings a third time and he leaps from the couch and yells, "Dammit, Beesly!" so that it grovels in his throat, stuck like rocks. He paces around the room and wishes he could throw something.
"Hey—"
"Pam? Pam, thank God—"
"—you've reached Pam Beesly, sorry that I can't take your call. Leave your name and num—"
He has already hung up the phone, already burst out to the driveway, and somehow put his keys—when did he even grab them?—into the ignition. It's all he can do not to press his foot farther than the gas pedal goes. He bolts out into the street and dials her number again, he'll dial it however many times he has to, he'll dial forever if that's what it takes.
This time he won't let Pam down. This time he's going to save her.
She hasn't run since high school, at least not with this sort of intensity in her speed. Her music player is blared up loud enough that she can't hear the cars on the road or even the squad of fire trucks that passes her. She only feels the internal rhythm of her legs in motion, and it's glorious and selfish and free.
As she runs she imagines that she is dumping little pieces of her life behind her on the sidewalk. There goes all stress in the office; there goes all her worry that she'll never achieve her ambitions, or even realize them; there goes her unattended art show, and the night she spent curled up in bed crying over it.
There goes ten years she wasted with the wrong man.
There goes the one chance she blew with the right one.
She realizes she has lost herself in the labyrinth of streets in some neighborhood she's never seen before, and she smiles. For once in her life she has nowhere to be. Nobody depending on her. She's just Pam Beesly, cut loose, self-defined.
It takes the better part of forty-five minutes to find her way back to recognizable territory, and she picks up her pace again, headed home. She imagines a warm shower followed by a book she's been too busy to get to reading. She imagines waking up in bed tomorrow with no expectations, nothing to let her down.
And with that thought in her mind she rounds the corner and comes to a terrified halt on the sidewalk.
At first she just sees the height of the flames licking the sky and cringes, the full effect of it not quite hitting her. Then she sees the row of fire trucks, the useless spurt of water aimed at the building, and the residents and passerby standing outside, their horror palpable on their faces.
"Oh my God," she says breathlessly. Her apartment is up in flames. Everything she owns—everything she cares about—
She chokes back a sob and walks toward it without thinking, as if getting closer will help it make sense. Her neighbor is standing outside gaping at it, clutching to his cat.
"What happened?" Pam asks, but her neighbor just shakes his head.
"There's a registration table for residents," he says quietly. "To try and gage how many people are still stuck in the building."
"People are stuck in the building?"
He nods, not quite looking at her.
Her stomach drops at the horrible notion. It's too awful to imagine. She hugs her arms to her chest and shuts her eyes and wishes it would all go away.
He parks illegally, knowing that nobody will notice in the chaos. He runs up to the nearest authority figure he can find, a police officer, and says, "I'm looking for Pam Beesly—"
"Hold on, sir. Are you a resident of this building?" the officer asks uselessly, taking out a notepad.
"No. I'm looking for Pam Beesly, she lives here—"
"I'm sorry, but you're going to have to take it up with the table back there, checking people in."
He plows through the crush of people until he reaches the desk of somber volunteers. "Beesly," he says, surprised he's even halfway coherent. "Pam—Pam Beesly, has she checked in?"
It seems to take the woman a lifetime to pore over her papers. There is real sympathy when she looks into his eyes and says, "I'm sorry, but nobody named Pam Beesly has checked in with us."
He can't move.
"Sir?"
The thought of losing her is a brick wall slamming into him. Unfathomable. Unreal. He's shaking, and for the first time in his adult life he feels real tears in his eyes.
"There's a chance she hasn't checked in yet, or that she was away from the building at the time of the—"
"No," Jim mutters. "She's always home at eight."
He turns away, unwilling to let the woman watch his devastation. He stumbles around the police tape, staring up to the seventh floor, imagining the worst and hating himself for it.
The grief is suffocating him. He forces himself away from the scene and back toward the crowd of onlookers, barely making eye contact with anyone. It's too overwhelming, too insane. He feels a shudder in his chest as he chokes back the flood of anguish and remorse.
When he reaches the curb he just sits at the end of it and buries his head in his hands. "This can't be happening," he says. He swipes at the tears on his face and looks out into the street.
That's when he sees her. Watches her jog over, her music player limp in her hands, her mouth agape in shock. She's like a dream to him. He's seen her so many times that it would be all too easy to just imagine her there, so perfect and whole.
Without thinking he scrambles back up to his feet, his eyes locked on her. He watches as if in a trance as she addresses someone next to her, then hugs her arms to her chest, tears welling in her eyes.
She's beautiful. She can't be real, but she is.
He races toward her, a ridiculous grin bursting on his face. "Beesly!" he yells, and when she doesn't turn around he barrels into her, scooping her up and spinning her in the air.
She squeals at the sensation of her feet leaving the pavement. She can't see who it is and jolts in fear until she hears his voice, so familiar and warm.
"Jim." His name sounds like a safe place to land, and as she thinks that he sets her down on the ground, his eyes scanning her as if to verify she's there.
"Pam," he says, and it's the more emotion than she's ever heard in his voice. "I thought . . . I thought I'd lost you. I thought you were—"
He wraps his arms around her. She doesn't even think to ask him how he knew to be here, how he knew she needed him so desperately. She falls into his embrace and sobs, lets herself sink into him, and he is her shield, protecting her from this nightmare.
She sobs into his chest and he strokes her back. "Everything's gone. My—my photos, my computer, all my artwork . . ."
"But you're okay," he murmurs into her hair. "You're alright, and that's all that matters."
She allows herself a little half-smile, but then her stomach sinks and she shakes her head. "Where am I going to go?"
He breaks their hug and keeps his hands on her shoulders, looking her in the eye. "You'll stay with me tonight. You'll stay as long as you have to. It's going to be okay."
And only because Jim Halpert says it, she believes it.
He's supposed to be sleeping on the couch, but for the life of him he can't. Every twenty minutes he gets up to peek into his room, where Pam Beesly is sleeping like an angel in his bed. Her hair is matted across his pillows, her arms hugging the sheets to herself, her breathing soft and even.
Everything about this moment is perfect. And no matter what the future holds for the two of them, at least she's still here. At least he can hold onto this moment forever.
Hope you liked it :)