She tries her best to be composed, to play it cool.
"I'm sorry, what was the question?"
She has asked, but she knows she is failing at the whole playing-it-cool thing, because she is feeling her smile taking over any other possible gesture. The cameraman chuckles and the interviewer says they are all set for the day.
Which, really, is a relief.
Now she's outside the conference room, head full of questions, and her eyes are looking for him, while the rest of her body walks to her desk as if nothing was different. As if that word, date, was not reverberating against her skull. Because he said date, didn't he? D. A. T. E.?
Kelly and Oscar pass next to her and mechanically she answers their good-byes. It's past five and people are leaving. Most unnervingly, Jim is nowhere to be seen.
With a confused sigh Pam sits and there it is. A purple post-it on the corner of her computer screen that wasn't there when she entered the conference room.
"Had to drop off some stuff. Pick you up at 7. J."
Again that smile is there, and she lowers her head so that Toby won't notice it as he passes her desk. Carefully she takes the note, folds it and puts it inside her purse. It's silly, really, to keep a scribbled piece of paper, but for her this is a promise. Hope.
* Cover art borrowed from Marisa Livingston