Whatever Happens: Chapter 4

Thanks again to all the people who are reviewing. Reviews really mean a lot to me.

I got this chapter up fairly quickly (for me, anyway). Plus, it's pretty long (again, for me), so double bonus!

Enjoy!

"Hey, Pam. Kelly told me you and Roy are pregnant."

Pam looked up from her game of solitaire to see Toby standing in front of her desk. "More me than Roy, but yeah," she replied lightly.

"That's great," Toby added.

"Yeah, we're really excited. You heading out?"

"Yeah. You?"

Pam glanced at the clock. It was a few minutes after five; Roy should be coming up soon, and then they would walk out together. "Yeah, any minute now," she answered.

"All right, well, see you tomorrow," he added, before ducking his head and heading out the door.

Pam resumed her game, smiling. Her plan to have Kelly tell everyone had gone perfectly. In just twenty-four hours since telling Kelly, everybody in the office had come up to Pam and told her congratulations, beginning with Michael and ending now with Toby. Dwight had even gone so far as to give her the number of the midwife who had delivered him. Pam had discreetly put it through the shredder later, but she appreciated the thought behind the gesture.

"Hey babe, you ready?" Roy's voice brought her out of her thoughts.

"Yeah, one moment." Pam moved a six onto a five, which one click later unveiled the fourth ace. She could see the end in sight: three, maybe four more moves, and Pam would win.

"C'mon, Pam." Pam looked up at him. Roy looked irritated. Maybe it had been a bad day for him. Not wanting to start a fight at work, Pam closed her game-two moves away, goshdarnit- and turned off her computer. She grabbed her purse from under her desk, and obediently followed her husband out the door.

Under his porchlight, Jim was fumbling with his keys. After weeks in Stamford, he still couldn't easily locate the key to his new apartment. It was a cramped, one-bedroom place, and Jim wasn't particularly fond of it. As a single person, he didn't really need more space, but it felt more like a cheap hotel room than his home. Plus, the key looked and felt just like all his other keys, making it impossible to find quickly.

Finally, he found the proper key and unlocked the door. Jim picked up his bag of take-out food and went inside. He flipped a light switch, illuminating the living room/kitchen room, and dropped his bag on the ground. He made his way to the refrigerator for a beer, glancing at the clock on his microwave. 6:32. Thirty-three hours since Pam had told him.

Jim uncapped the beer, and took a sip. Yesterday had been hard, but so had today. He wondered if it would get easier to live with the knowledge. It probably would; hopefully it would. Jim could barely admit it to himself, but even after Roy and Pam got married, he'd harbored the hope that someday Pam might change her mind about Roy. After all, people get divorced all the time. If Pam divorced Roy, well, maybe Jim and Pam would have a shot then. But a baby... a baby was permanent. There was no divorcing a child. Pam might be the kind of person who would tell a friend she was having a baby without thinking about how it would affect them, but she would never leave her child. Jim took another sip of his beer, before sighing and setting it on the counter. The drink wouldn't fix the situation. He looked at the bag from the Chinese place Karen had recommended, but realized he wasn't hungry anyway so he opened the refrigerator door and slid the bag in.

Then he left the kitchen/living room and went into the bedroom. A few minutes later, Jim emerged wearing sweat pants and a plain gray t-shirt. There was no one to impress here, no need to look nice. He hit the power button on the remote, turning the TV on, and began to channel surf. Jim kept meaning to get the cable set up, but hadn't got around to it yet. This made his choices rather limited: a documentary on grasshoppers, an informercial for make-up, or a marathon of 'America's Next Top Model'. Grasshoppers freaked him out, he had no need for make-up, and so Jim went with 'America's Next Top Model'.

Drawn into the drama of the excessively thin girls, Jim lost track of time. The next thing he knew, his neighbor's loud grandfather clock was chiming twelve times- it was midnight. Jim shook his head, amazed that so much time could pass so quickly, before standing and stretching his arms above his head. He reached for the remote and was about to turn the television off when there was the sound of someone knocking on his door.

Jim froze, wondering who could be visiting him this late. Maybe Andy had sent him a pizza to get back at him for calling at eleven o'clock at night to ask for some Call of Duty tips (how was Jim supposed to know that Andy went to bed promptly at ten on work nights?). Maybe one of his neighbors was at the door. Or, maybe it was an axe murderer, who had just so happened to pick his apartment, out of the thousands of other apartments in Stamford. Hey, Jim thought, you never know.

To be on the safe side, Jim pulled back the edge of the curtain on one of his windows to see. Once Jim saw who it was, he knew he would have been less surprised to see the axe murderer. Stunned and surprised, Jim slowly moved to the door. He fumbled with the lock for a few seconds before pulling the door open.

"Hey," Jim said softly.

"Hey," Pam echoed, hands jammed into the pockets of her jeans and staring at the ground.

Jim leaned against the door frame casually, as though she showed up on his doorstep at midnight all the time. "What're you doing here?"

She shrugged. "I was in the neighborhood…" Pam trailed off, the faintest shadow of a grin spreading across her face.

"Oh, really. Tell me, are you in my neighborhood a lot, Beesly?" Jim asked lightly. Oh, wait. He couldn't call her Beesly anymore. Judging by how stiff she suddenly seemed, she had caught his slip also. He cleared his throat. "Right, sorry."

"It's all right," Pam muttered, still inspecting her toes.

"Is everything okay?" Jim asked, a bit concerned by her unwillingness to look at him.

She didn't answer right away. Finally, Pam said, "You know, I probably shouldn't have come here. I'll just... I'll just go." Pam jerked her thumb back towards the apartment complex's parking lot. "Sorry to bother you so late."

Jim watched as she turned and began to walk away. His brain screamed at him to tell her to stop, to tell her to wait and tell her to tell him what was going on, but his muscles seemed paralyzed. It took until the time Pam had walked away from his door, all the way to the sidewalk leading to the parking lot for his vocal chords to comply. "Pam, no, wait!" Jim called. Pam paused. Jim bolted from his door, and when he was close enough, gently placed a hand on her shoulder and spun her around. Fresh tears shimmered in her eyes, but based on how red and puffy her eyes were, Pam had been crying for a long time before now.

"Pam, what's wrong?" Jim demanded, deeply concerned now. It didn't matter how deeply she had hurt him in the past. Right now, he wanted nothing more than to wrap his arms around her tightly and hug her until she felt better, even if that meant that they would stay on the sidewalk all night long. But Pam was married now, and Jim couldn't behave the way he wanted. He would have to settle for a hand on her shoulder.

She shook her head, and tried to turn away, but Jim's hand continued to apply gentle pressure, urging her to face him. "It's nothing," she whispered, a lone tear slipping down her cheek.

Jim tilted his head, his expression serious. "Pam, it's not nothing," he insisted. Not if it's got you so worked up, Jim added in his head.

Pam drew a deep, shuddering breath before answering. "Roy and I had a fight."

Anger bubbled up inside of him. Roy. Of course it was Roy's fault. Jim had tried to make his peace with the fact that Roy was Pam's husband, but if Roy was going to upset Pam so, he certainly didn't deserve to be married to her. Making his resentment of Roy known now would not help Pam, however, so Jim forced it down. "Okay," Jim said. "Let's go back inside. You can splash some water on your face, and then if you want, we can talk about it. Okay?"

Pam hesitated, but finally agreed. "Okay."

Jim turned, and slowly led her back to his apartment. He contemplated wrapping an arm around her, thinking that it might bring her some comfort, but ultimately decided that pushing the boundaries wasn't the best idea just then.

"The bathroom's that way," Jim told her, pointing to one of the two closed doors in his apartment, once they were inside his apartment.

"Thanks." Pam sniffled, walking into the bathroom.

Jim heard the facet running a moment later and sat down on the couch. He stood up instantly as it occurred to him that perhaps Pam would like something to eat, and walked briskly over to the refrigerator. The only food he had was the Chinese take-out from earlier; it would have to do. Jim took out a couple cartons of rice and placed them in the microwave. By the time Pam emerged from the bathroom, the food was done and steaming.

"I thought you might be hungry," Jim explained, gesturing at the cartons of rice.

"Starving, actually," she replied, moving closer. Pam seemed much calmer now. Jim scooped rice into two bowls and handed one to her, keeping one for himself.

"I, uh, haven't gotten around to buying a table or chairs, so we can just eat on the couch," Jim offered, somewhat embarrassed by his living conditions. He had been there for over a month; there was no good reason for him to not be entirely settled in yet. Jim supposed that the real reason he hadn't bought chairs or had his cable set up was because he didn't care much anymore. Until this evening, no one except him was ever around to care, so what did it really matter if his home wasn't very homely?

"Sure." Pam followed him to the couch and sat next to him. "So what are we watching?"

Jim's eyes flickered to the television. Uh oh, he thought, cringing. Jim had forgotten to turn off 'America's Next Top Model'. It was on a commercial break currently; maybe if he changed the channel quickly…. No, he was too late. The theme song was starting, indicating the commencement of the next episode. It was painfully obvious exactly what he was watching.

"'America's Next Top Model'?" Pam's voice was accusing. Jim turned to look at her, and she looked moderately amused, considering the situation. He could tell she was hiding a smirk.

"I was… channel surfing?" He tried, hopefully, turning the television off.

Pam shook her head, giggling softly. "I caught you red-handed, Halpert. Admit it."

"Never," Jim said dramatically.

A silence descended upon them as both of them ate their rice. Jim still wasn't particularly hungry, but he was willing to force himself to eat so Pam wouldn't feel weird. Eventually, Pam finished her bowl.

"Thank you," she said, softly. Something in the way Pam said it suggested she was grateful for more than just the rice

"No trouble." Jim set his bowl on the floor. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Pam sighed, staring at her empty bowl. "Roy, um, had a bad day at work today. One of the warehouse guys kept messing with him, and the point is Roy was really irritated by the time we went home. I, uh, I suggested that maybe we should go get some parenting books, since we weren't really busy but Roy just wanted to relax and watch the game. He kind of snapped at me, and I snapped back, and then we both started yelling at each other and name calling… and it wasn't pretty."

"I'm sure it wasn't," Jim responded, when she paused. "He really got that worked up about parenting books?"

Pam shook her head. "We were arguing about all sorts of stuff. It seems like we've been doing that a lot since… we've been arguing a lot lately."

"I see."

"I don't get so upset, usually," she admitted, lifting her head and looking at him. "I just… I don't know. Tonight I just couldn't take it anymore." Pam paused, allowing Jim to nod understandingly. "And then I couldn't stay there anymore. I needed somewhere else to go, so I came here."

"Yeah, how did you figure out where I live?" Jim asked. It had finally occurred to him that Pam shouldn't know where his apartment in Stamford was.

She smiled slightly. "I have my sources," she replied, yawning. "Ugh. I should probably get going. It's late, and you probably want to get to sleep." Pam stood, picked up her bowl, and took it over to the sink.

Jim also stood. "Pam, Scranton is two hours away," he pointed out.

She turned around, and walked back over to her spot on the couch where she had left her purse. "I know. I should get going."

"Why don't you just… why don't you just stay here? Just for tonight," Jim added hastily, not wanting his intentions to be misinterpreted.

Pam hesitated. "I don't know…"

"C'mon. You're exhausted. And do you really want to go back to him right now?"

"No, but I don't want you to feel like you have to let me stay."

"I know I don't have to," Jim replied. "But the salesman was quite adamant that this couch unfolds to a full-sized bed somehow, and besides, it's late."

"You really don't mind?"

"No, I really don't," Jim said, truthfully. "Now, come on and help me get these cushions out of the way."

Pam deposited her purse on the counter and helped him move the couch cushions to the side. She watched as Jim struggled to pull the bed out and wrestled with the mattress briefly to get it to lie flat. When he was satisfied, Jim stood up straight. "I, uh, I don't have an extra set of sheets," he admitted, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. "Hang on…" Jim went into his bedroom and came back with a folded cotton blanket. "Sorry, this is all I have." He tossed it onto the mattress.

"That's fine." Pam smiled. "Thank you."

"All right then. Well, I'm going to go to sleep now. If you need anything else, you know where to find me," Jim said.

"Okay." Pam kicked off her shoes and unfolded the blanket as Jim walked back into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him.

Inside his room, Jim collapsed onto his bed. It was late, past one o'clock in the morning now, and his muscles were fatigued. But she was here, in his apartment! Pam was spending the night at his apartment! She was going to fall asleep here, dream here, wake up here….

The thought had him completely enthralled for nearly a minute, before Jim drifted off to sleep.