-1Pam glanced at the cheap, digital hotel clock that sat on the nightstand that stood between the two beds. Its red digits told her that it was 1:48 AM. She sighed, bringing her hand roughly through her curls. She couldn't sleep. She had her sketchpad resting in her lap and her hand hovered over the page, pencil gripped loosely in her fingers. She had been trying for the past forty-five minutes to draw this stupid lamp, but for some reason it just wouldn't turn out right. She was surprised to realize that she was a little bit tired of drawing still life. While she had once taken pleasure in capturing the nuances of simple, everyday items, it now felt boring. She wanted to draw something real, something that made a statement about her.
The room was humid and stuffy, so Pam lifted herself off her bed and padded softly over to the window. She unlocked it, but when she tried to lift it up it stubbornly refused. "Oh, come on," she said, gritting her teeth as she threw all of her slight body weight into the effort. Angela stirred in her sleep, and Pam froze. The last thing she wanted to do was incur the wrath of a tired, grumpy Angela.
Suddenly, someone knocked on her door, a playful rat-ta-tat-tat. She smiled, relieved. There was no doubt about who it could be. She opened the door swiftly, grinning when she saw that it was indeed Jim. Her eyes widened slightly when she realized he was wearing just a gray t-shirt and a pair of boxers. Her mouth suddenly went dry. She was equally surprised by the miserable look on his face. She cocked her head to the side questioningly.
"There's a 12 hour marathon of Battlestar Galactica on the SciFi network," he said, his eyes miserable.
Pam chuckled, hiding her smile behind her hand. "Oh, poor baby," she crooned. Jim glared at her.
"It's not funny, Beesly!" he protested. "Dwight's determined to stay up for the whole thing, so he drank, like, eight freakin' cups of coffee. He is off the walls!"
"Um, well, I would totally offer you asylum here but Angela's getting her beauty sleep and hell hath no fury like… well, like Angela," Pam said, glancing back into the room. Jim groaned, running his fingers restlessly through his hair, unwittingly making it stick up in the back. Something about his tousled hair made Pam feel short of breath, and she gripped the door a little bit harder. She felt far too awake right now; her blood rushing through her so quickly, she felt lightheaded. She felt free and daring, for the first time in a while. Maybe it's something I ate, she thought giddily.
An idea struck her. "Hey," she whispered, "do you want to just go sit on the beach for a while? I can't sleep, and I'm bored."
Jim raised his eyebrows, his eyes wide, but the expression quickly disappeared with an ease that came from practice. "Sure," he shrugged, grinning. Pam beamed back with childish excitement.
"Uh, okay, hold on just a second," she said as she went back into the room. She tiptoed around the room, first going to a cabinet and grabbing an extra blanket to lie on the sand. After a moment of consideration she also grabbed her sketchpad and pencil. "Ready?" she asked as she slipped outside of the room and shut the door softly.
He took the blanket from her and threw it over his shoulder. "Lead the way," he said.
She grinned, heading off towards the elevator at a slight jog. She didn't know why she was running; it wasn't like they were doing something that could get them in trouble. But it still felt like she was sneaking out of her parents' house, off to have one of those late night adventures that teenagers had. She had never done that. Roy had wanted her to, but she had been too scared, too timid. But now…well, Pam wasn't positive what exactly she was doing. And it felt good.
xxxx
Pam realized after a moment that they were both barefoot, but in her excitement she couldn't care less. The pavement had still managed to retain some of the sun's heat, and it's rough warmth felt good on the soles of Pam's feet. The streets were empty and quiet, lit by the orange glow of the streetlamps.
Jim and Pam quickly found their way to the beach, walking through the dunes and sand grass before they reached the stretch of land where the sand gave way to the ocean. The waves lapped at the shore hungrily, the sound repetitive and soothing, the breeze playing with the hem of Pam's pajama pants.
"Wow," Jim said, his voice sounding breathless. When Pam turned to look at him, he simply pointed to the sky where the moon hung, heavy and full. Beams of light drifted down upon the endless expanse of ocean, making it appear as though the sea had been strewn with thousands of silver-colored jewels.
"Oh, wow," Pam murmured in agreement. She took the blanket from Jim's shoulder and beckoned as she said quietly, "C'mon." She walked a little further down the beach, then taking an edge of the blanket, unfurled it, so it floated down gently to rest on the sand. She dusted off her feet, then sat, feeling the sand shift under her weight. Jim joined her, lying back and propping himself up on his elbows, gazing off towards the illuminated water.
"Tell me something you've never told anyone else before," Pam said suddenly. Here on this beach, so far away from the tiny, claustrophobic office in Pennsylvania, she felt a random urge to know the Jim outside of work. She wanted to know about his life.
He looked at her, eyebrows slightly furrowed. "Hmm, something I've never told anyone else before?" he mused, squinting his eyes slightly in thought. He was silent for a minute and Pam waited nervously, wondering if she had crossed a line.
She was just about to speak, to tell him he didn't have to answer when he finally said, "I had a hit-and-run once. Not like a person or anything. It was, uh, only a month after I had gotten my license, and I was so psyched about it. And I was backing out of a parking space and I hit a parked car. I was so freaked out, and no one was around, so I just left. I was so embarrassed, I never told anybody." His smiled drifted between shyness and amusement.
"How bad was the damage?"
Jim grimaced, then chuckled. "Pretty bad. I pretty much owned their headlights."
"Ouch," Pam laughed. "I think it's like a statistic that every teenager driver has at least one accident in their first six months of driving," she said. "I got into a fender bender at an intersection a few months after I got my license." She then smiled wickedly. "But I stayed at the scene of the crime."
Jim grinned, shaking his head. "Tell me something about yourself that you've never told anyone before," he shot back at her, his eyes daring.
She thought for a moment before something came to mind. A somber feeling rushed over her, and she looked down at her hands, picking a fingernail.
Jim sensed the shift in mood, and said, "It's okay, you know, you don't have to--"
"No, no, it's okay," Pam said, smiling weakly. "No, it's just… okay, well, one time I was home alone, and I was uh, making myself dinner, and this, this mouse scurried across the floor! And I'm totally terrified of mice, and before I knew what I was doing, I stomped on it." Her voice grew quieter. "And I just felt so awful. It was so little, and it didn't do anything wrong except run across my floor, and I killed it. I felt so guilty, I started bawling my eyes out." Pam was mortified to feel her eyes water just thinking about it. She sniffled, and hastily wiped her hand across her eyes. "I-I never told anyone about it. I mean, I wanted to tell Roy, but he'd probably think it was stupid. It is stupid, just, I'd never killed anything before, and it was really, really little…" Pam sniffled again and she felt her throat thicken with tears. Ugh, I'm such a baby! she thought. I'm a grown woman crying about a mouse for Christ's sake.
She looked up when she felt Jim's warm hand rest on her shoulder. "It's not stupid," he said quietly, but Pam just shook her head and laughed sadly. "No, really, it's not," he said again. "I mean, some people can kill other people without feeling any remorse at all. It takes a pretty incredible woman to feel so much guilt for accidentally killing a mouse. And it was an accident," he smiled comfortingly, tucking a strand of hair that had fallen into her face behind her ear.
Pam wrapped her arms around herself, smiling and looking at Jim through her glistening eyes. She sniffed again, and groaned. "Now I'm all sniffly and gross," she said plaintively, and Jim laughed.
Her gaze fell upon her sketchbook and pencil that lay in the sand next to her. "Um, do you think I could draw you?" she asked quickly, before she lost her nerve. He looked at her, and she turned bright red. "Well, just lately -- I'm like, kind of tired of doing still life, and I thought maybe…" her voice trailed off.
"Sure," he said simply. Pam couldn't be sure, but she thought she heard a hint of nervousness in his voice. He coughed. "Um, what should I do, I mean…" his voice trailed off awkwardly as Pam flipped to a new page in her sketchbook. She was lucky the moon was full; there was just enough light for her to see by.
"Uh, I guess just…find a point in space to focus on, and try not to move too much. Are you comfortable?"
"Yeah-oh wait, hold on," he said. He lay on his back fully, crossing his arms behind his head as he gazed up at the stars.
Perfect, Pam thought, as she began sketch the contours of his face.
xxxx
Jim's arms had begun to cramp, but he didn't want to complain. At first he worried Pam would notice the blush creeping up his neck as she stared at him intently, but she seemed so absorbed in her work that he slowly began to relax. After a while he had made a game of trying to break her concentration by telling dirty jokes about Kevin and Meredith. She played her part by responding with mock sternness, fighting valiantly to banish the smile that tugged at the corners of her mouth.
"Can I see?" he asked out of the side of his mouth, trying not to move.
"Hush!" she said reproachfully. "No moving!"
Jim lay silent for a few more moments, but when she seemed particularly involved in the drawing and wasn't looking up, he shifted forward, trying to sneak a peek. She looked up, startled, and it made his heart pound to realize how close they were. She blushed, (She's so damn cute when she blushes, he thought) and smacked him in the shoulder. "Hey, no!" she said, bringing her sketchpad up to hide the drawing. Despite her stern tone, she was smiling.
Jim did his best puppy dog impression (which he had been told could be deadly when used properly). "Please?" he said pitifully, but she just rolled her eyes.
She paused for a moment, considering. "Fine," she said grudgingly, turning an even deeper shade of red as she tossed the sketchpad to him. "It's not that good," she said quickly. "I've never really drawn people before."
Jim disregarded her comments as he looked down at the drawing in his lap. His first thought was, Is this really how she sees me? It didn't look like how he saw himself, but the likeness was undeniable. He chuckled, trying to alleviate the sudden tension. "You made me look like a model, Beesly! While your technique leaves nothing to be desired, I'm afraid you've been far too generous with my looks," he said, adopting the pretentious accent of an art aficionado.
"No -- I wasn't," Pam said softly.
His heart stopped. "What?" he asked, his voice low.
Her eyes met his briefly, but before he could read them they flickered away, skittish. She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. "What time is it?" she asked suddenly, still not looking at him.
Jim blinked, and it took a moment for his mind to catch up to what she had asked. "Oh -- um, it's uh…" he glanced down at his watch, "it's almost quarter to four."
Pam laughed, but it was breathless and strained. "Wow, you're kidding. Uh, I guess we should probably be heading back now. I'm kind of tired." Not waiting for him to respond, she stood, and scooped up the troublesome sketchpad, the pencil already tucked behind her ear. She seemed somewhat deflated suddenly. All the girlish exuberance that had filled her earlier in the evening seemed to have fled with the encroaching dawn.
She waited for him a little ways up the beach as he stood and shook out the blanket. They walked back to the hotel in silence.
xxxx
Jim walked Pam back to her room, partly out of reluctance to return to his own room (where he knew Dwight awaited him), and partially because his mom had strongly ingrained in him that you always walk a girl to her front door. Even if that girl is someone else's fiancée? he bitterly asked himself.
"Oh, shit," Pam cursed, bringing Jim out of his thoughts. He couldn't help grinning; Pam swore so rarely that he was endlessly amused whenever she did.
"What's up?" he asked as she tugged hopelessly at the door handle.
She sighed. "I forgot a key," she said, "and I don't want to spend the rest of the trip with Angela mad at me because I woke her up at four in the morning to let me in. Plus," she looked at Jim hesitantly, "she'd probably be kinda, um, judgmental about me being out this late."
Jim heard her unspoken words: 'out this late with you.' It was astonishing to him that even some of their coworkers could pick up on what Pam herself had not. From the reprimanding looks that Angela often sent him, Jim knew what she thought of the situation. He was pretty sure that Ryan knew but couldn't care less, and he could tell from the little smile that Phyllis got whenever he and Pam were laughing about something that she wasn't fooled.
"Uh, well," he said, "I would offer you my bed and I could sleep on the floor, but that would include dealing with Dwight. An over-caffeinated Dwight."
Pam groaned and looked around. "Okay, well, I guess we'll just have to pop a squat." She sat down, leaning her back again the wall.
Jim laughed outright. "'Pop a squat'?" he said incredulously.
Pam looked at him, completely serious. "Yeah!" she said. "You know, we'll just hang out in the hallway until morning or something. What else can we do?"
Call security and have them open the door, Jim thought, but he much preferred this option. Smiling, he sat down next to Pam and spread the still-sandy blanket over both of them. Pam yawned, squinting her eyes and wrinkling her nose.
"We'll just wait for everyone else to wake up," she said muzzily. They sat up for a moment staring at the pale pink wall in front of them, but Pam's eyes kept sliding shut. Her head would fall forward only to jerk upright again.
Jim smiled to himself at Pam's efforts to stay awake. "Hey, Pam," he whispered.
"Huh?"
"Do you want to just take a nap, and I'll wake you up when everyone else wakes up?"
"Mmmkay," Pam said happily, promptly snuggling in against Jim's side, her head resting on his shoulder. His heart ached at her sleepy, affectionate touch, but as much as it hurt it felt equally amazing. He rested his head against the wall, and waited for sunrise.
AN: I've actually never been to a Country Inn, so I don't know if their windows don't work or if their clocks are cheap. I just kinda chose a random place. So…sorry Country Inn. I'm sure you're great.
I also don't own Battlestar Galactica or the SciFi network. Obviously.
Reviews really do make me write faster. No joke. And, if I get enough reviews, you might get to hear about Dwight's Speedo next episode! How will Angela react to that?