I suppose this is AU, because it doesn't fit anywhere with canon. If you must place it, I would place it in season 3, right at the very very end. It was just a little something bouncing around inside my head that wouldn't stretch itself properly into a full story. And, since I'm dabbling in drabbles lately anyway, here it is!

I'm not sure how happy I am with it; you, dear readers, will help me decide that. So be kind, and review!


Inhibitions

They said alcohol loosened your inhibitions, and Pam was nothing but inhibitions, layers upon layers of them caked on like stale midnights and grime. She'd gotten drunk maybe twice in her whole life; but breaking into Creed's desk was easier than she'd thought it would be, and the bottles were there, and with Michael's forced jokes crumpled up on the floor and the detritus of despair, the remains of the office Christmas party, all around her, well – it was December 22nd, and she was alone, and she was lonely.

The light was dim, monitors in the empty after-hours dark, but after the first whiskey that didn't matter; by the second she was crying with the pain of the regrets falling away, and by the third she was laughing, swaying, crazy and finally in a place above despair, above mundane, a reeling blindness resolutely ignoring all the pitfalls and chasms and heartbreaks below.

With the third whiskey she entered the wild stage, where she might have done something stupid, like try to fly off the roof or go and serenade Jim Halpert under his window. The only reason she didn't was because Jim Halpert came in just then (he'd left his coat), and found her broken and half-weeping on the floor, and all nonchalant and chivalrous he picked up the pieces. He picked up his best friend, and he carried her out of the echo-haunted building and into the night.

"I never knew you were such a wild girl, Beesly," he murmured as he helped her into his car, wrapping the retrieved coat around her trembling shoulders.

"I thought it would help," she hiccupped, miserable again, crying without noticing. "You know, with – with us. With the s-secret love thing." A pause. "Has it helped?"

He was silent, thoughtful, backing up and pulling out into the skeletal emptiness of Scranton at night. "Maybe a little," he answered after a while; but he looked over and saw that Pam had fallen asleep.

And though he knew she was hurting dark and deep, he couldn't help but smile; because she looked so beautiful in the flurry of passing streetlights, because now that he knew the hurt was there they could fix it, together (and maybe get to a place where neither of them would ever have to feel that particular pain again).

Stopped at a red light, he leaned over and kissed her forehead, the taste of her forbidden and sweet. He whispered, "It has helped. It's helped more than you know."

The light turned green, and he drove off into the darkness, and the snow, and the future.

The next day, neither one of them showed up for work.


Open-ended, I know, but I kind of like the you-decide-what-happened kind of thing, every once in a while. If there's an overwhelming demand, maybe I'll write more, but I make no promises.

So, what did you think? Review!