October, 1997

"I'm telling you boys, Saturday night's the night. Homecoming, baby… it's all set…"

"Woohoo, gonna get her to give it up, eh?"

The cat calls and backslaps seemed to echo off the lockers and reverberate to the far row where Jim sat alone, his knees on his elbows, shirt in his hands, jeans unbuttoned.

He sucked air in through his teeth.

Fucking Roy Anderson talking about his Pam that way, like she was some number on a scoreboard.

"But she's not your Pam," the voice in his head told him. "She's Roy's. That's what she wants."

Jim fought the urge to kick the lockers in front of him. Sometimes it was confusing as hell, having a girl for a best friend.

It wasn't that he wanted to be the one dating her, or planning to have sex with her at homecoming (though the thought of Pam and Roy having sex did make him throw up in his mouth a little); he kind of felt like he wanted to arm wrestle with Pam, not kiss her. Not that kissing her was an unpleasant thought, it was just that he… well, he missed her, damn it. She'd had less time to hang out since she'd started dating Roy last Spring, and Jim often found himself lacking a partner in crime.

And of course, there was the matter of Roy simply not being good enough for her. He wasn't flat mean or anything, he was just a prototypical meathead jock.

Jim just thought Pam was too good for him. She deserved someone better. Someone like…

Well, he didn't know like whom. But he knew she deserved someone who…

"Hey Halpert!"

He looked up. "Hey, guys," he replied, trying to sound congenial as Roy and his friends, Lonny and Daryl paused by the bench he was sitting on, making their way to the showers.

"Hey Halpert," Roy said again, "you're pretty tight with Pam, yeah?"

He nodded. "Yeah, she's my best friend."

Jim knew as soon as the words were out of his mouth that he was screwed.

"Best friend," Lonny cracked. "What, you two have one of those heart necklaces? You have slumber parties and braid each other's hair, practice French kissing on your pillows?"

"My sister and her friend used to practice kissing on each other at slumber parties," Daryl chimed in.

Lonny gaped. "Dude, that must've been so hot."

Daryl fixed him with a smack upside the head. "Dude, that's my sister!"

"Guys, shut up," Roy yelled, silencing them. "Halpert, you do me a favor?"

"No," he imagined himself saying, "no, I have no desire to do you any favors." But Jim didn't like to cause trouble where there didn't need to be any, so he simply replied:

"Yeah, what's up?"

Roy snickered a little. "Since you and Pam are like, girlfriends or whatever, will you just let her know that, you know, I really like black lace panties?"

Someone who didn't say stuff like that in the locker room. That's the least Pam deserved.

Jim found himself fighting two simultaneous urges. The first was the more primal urge to pop Roy Anderson in the face and inform him, in no uncertain terms, that his meathead ways were just not acceptable when it came to Jim's best friend.

Yeah, best friend. That's what she was to him, slumber party jokes be damned.

The second instinct Jim fought was the one Pam called his wiseass button. The one that made him have to literally swallow to not tell Roy, in the calmest of tones, that he wasn't really comfortable hearing about what kind of panties Roy liked to wear, black lace or otherwise.

Instead, he just nodded innocuously. "Yeah, you know, if it comes up."

That seemed good enough, and the three guys continued on their way to the showers. Jim pulled his shirt over his head and, slinging his backpack on to one shoulder, headed toward the door, wondering, incredulously, exactly how Roy had imagined one would approach such a topic with one's closest female friend.

"Hey, Pam, you got a sec? Cool, yeah, I just want to talk to you about your panties…"

"You're into her. You want Pam."

Jim sighed, propping his feet up on his headboard and mentally kicking himself in the ass for calling his brother at college in the first place."

"Pete," he sighed. "Not everything is about sex. She's my…"

"Best friend," Pete interrupted, "I know, you've said so. But if you're just friends, why are you so bent out of shape about Roy Anderson wanting to have sex with her?"

Jim seethed. "It's just…you should have heard how he was talking about it, like she was some conquest or something."

Pete laughed. "Jim, you're in high school. Sex is a conquest. Come on, you can't tell me it isn't the same for you.

Silence.

"Oh my god," Pete realized, sounding like he was holding in laughter. "Jimmy, are you a virgin?"

"Blow me," Jim replied eloquently.

This time Pete didn't even try to hold in the laughter. "Yeah, no," he told his brother, "but more importantly, has anybody?"

Jim kicked the headboard in frustration. "Why the fuck do I talk to you?" he wondered aloud. "Why do I ask you shit?"

"Alright, alright." He could see Pete's hands in the air. "I'm sorry. What do you want me to tell you?"

Jim pushed a hand through his thick hair. "I don't know, Pete," he nearly whined. "Tell me how to tell her that Roy's a dick and she shouldn't date him."

"Maybe he's not a dick to her," Pete said quietly.

Jim scoffed. "Did you not hear…"

"Yeah, black lace panties, I know," Pete sighed. "Guy's got good taste, at least."

"Are you adopted?"

Pete sighed. "Look, here's the thing, Jimmy. If you really think he's bad for her, tell her, but she might not listen. And more than that, she might not be too happy with you for saying so in the first place. So I gotta ask, is it about her or is it about you? Because you need to know that."

Jim didn't say a word.

Pete called out to him through the phone. "Hey, Jim? Jimmy?"

Jim finally answered his brother's question.

"I have no idea."