AN: Okay guys, I know what you're thinking...Two updates in one day, Shiggity, you monster. Yes it's true. Haha, but really, I wrote this chapter in one sitting while i really didn't want to (but I was bored) and suddenly it became the very best chapter of anything ever written (I know big exaggeration) so I had to post it immedaitely. Also it is very long, two pages longer than most, but with these gifts come downfalls. There is a high probability that I will not be able to update tomorrow, because of the double post today, and the next chapter will be shorter than others, because I kind of cut into it. So I apologize for that.

Thanks so much for the favorites/alerts/reviews/love of this story. It makes me happy.

This is probably my favorite chapter so far, so i hope you'll throughly enjoy it.

Receptionist Day

Chapter 4

Crumple

"You know what was awesome?" Andy propelled his office chair forward so he sat in the niche between Jim and Dwight, "When we sold fifty reams of paper. That was awesome."

Jim, who was clearly amused, watched from behind Andy, as Dwight reacted, "Selling fifty reams of paper is nothing to be proud of," Dwight reiterated, "Anyone can sell fifty reams of paper. Jim does it all the time and he's a slacker."

Andy turned in his chair to face Jim, who shrugged and nodded in agreement with Dwight. "It's not the number that's important," Andy informed in a hushed voice.

"Really?" Jim questioned as he played with his pen, "Because that's kind of what you've been enforcing this entire time."

Andy shook his head, his voice growing lower still, "That was the first time I've sold paper with anybody else," he paused and let what he said sink in, "I know what you're thinking, 'Andy Bernard, you've been on thousands of sales calls before' and yes I have," his face grew dangerously stoic. "And every time I've come back empty handed."

Dwight said nothing as he stared at Andy, then final questioned, "I was your first?"

Jim's eyes grew big and he had to cover his growing smile with his hand.

"You were, Sir," Andy answered, "And I wouldn't have had it any other way."

Almost letting out a chuckle, Jim swiveled his chair to see if Pam was getting all of the interactions, but saw that Ryan was standing by reception talking to her. She in her hands she held a large bouquet of orange roses, they definitely trumped his tulips.

Jim watched a little embarrassed at his gift as they continued to talk, until he saw the way she smiled while trying to discard the roses to the side. He smiled and rose from his chair, ignoring the personal information Dwight and Andy were exchanging. He could tell that she was feeling awkward, and being ever the good boyfriend, he decided to save her.

"So I hope Michael hasn't made the day too unbearable for you," Ryan asked casually.

"Nope," she placed the roses on an empty part of her desk, "Michael's actually been one of the bearable people in here today."

"Really?" Ryan questioned pulling out his Blackberry, he began to type something rather quickly, with decreasing attention on Pam, "That doesn't sound right."

"Hey Ryan," Jim greeted holding out his hand. Ryan glanced off the screen of his device for a second, and chose to ignore Jim's gesture, "Alright," Jim accepted and turned to Pam with wide eyes.

"Pam, can you get Michael, please?" Ryan questioned as he finished his message.

Pam picked up the phone, and dialed Michael's extension, while Jim helped himself to the jellybeans on her desk.

"Michael, Ryan's here," Pam informed, then turned the chair away from Ryan whose attention was still on his blackberry, "So if you have any magic stuff out, you should put it away."

Clattering came from inside Michael's office, followed by a small crash, after a few moments, Michael opened the door, "Ryan, my liege," he greeted him with a hug, but Ryan quickly shoved out his hand to block the embrace.

"Michael, I'd like to get this meeting over with as quickly as possible," Ryan interrupted any further conversation Michael had before he started it, "I have a meeting with the corporate heads at five and I still have to drive back."

"Well then, let us get this meeting started," Michael pointed towards the conference room, "Everyone in the conference room now, and bring all the ideas in your brains."


"I'm not going to lie," Ryan shifted his eyes to see if anyone could see into the room, and did a shoulder check, "Corporate is thinking of downsizing again. The Scranton branch is the logical choice, it's in the smallest town, and has the smallest selling market. It also has the largest employee number out of all the branches," Ryan turned around to look through the window of the conference room to where Jim was sitting at his desk, "I can definitely see getting rid of some salesmen."


"Ladies and gentlemen, I hope you have brought the top ten ideas off your head to enhance this working operation," Michael stood at the front of the room, which was partially decorated in Brad Pitt pictures and green streamers. "Now I really don't know the most efficient way of conducting this Round Robin table of ideas, so maybe we'll go alphabetically, Stanley, you're up first."

"Actually Michael," Ryan stood from his seat where he was fighting to keep quiet, "it said in the memo my secretary sent, that everyone was supposed to type out their ideas, print them out and deliver them to me so I could read them aloud to discuss them."

"But them how would you know who typed what?" Michael questioned his voice faulting.

Ryan sighed, "You still write your name on it, it's just better to keep ideas anonymous."

Michael scoffed and glanced into the camera, "Please who ever changed anything by being anonymous?"

Ignoring Michael, Ryan turned to the rest of the group who were spread out around the table, "I hope you all thoroughly read the memo and came prepared."

Everyone began to pass their sheet of paper to Ryan as he collected them.

"Pam, you knew about this?" Michael questioned as he paced around the front of the room.

Pam, who was sitting at the end of the table, answered, "Yes, I just thought you would have read the memo that I printed out for you."


"I try to help Michael, I really do," Pam pressed with emotion, "I even print his memos out on bright paper with bright colors and clip art just so he'll look at them. But as soon as he realizes that it's a memo, he throws it away." She paused her eyes squinting slightly, "Maybe I should make it like an activity sheet, where he has to figure out missing words by a word search or something."


"Well thank you Pamela," Michael almost spat as he pulled and extra paper from the file splayed on the conference table, he scribbled something down with a pencil and turned back to Pam, "If it wasn't Receptionist Day, I would murder you."

Pam's expression was a little bitter as Michael turned away from her. Behind her Jim was wide-eyed with surprise.

"Alright do I have them all?" Ryan questioned as he straightened the pile of papers in his hand.

"No," Michael shoved his paper into Ryan's hand with a smile.

Ryan sighed at him in exasperation, fixing the papers once again as he waited for Michael to take his seat. When he didn't, Ryan gestured to the chair.

"Oh," Michael laughed as he crossed the front of the room, "Right, you like to fly alone."

"Okay," Ryan began after Michael had taken a seat. He stood at the front of the room, almost in the exact center, "before we start are there any questions?"

Kelly raised her hand, an almost malicious expression on her face. With an exaggerated sigh, Ryan pointed to her and she asked, "Why isn't Darryl here?"

"Darryl is part of the warehouse staff," Ryan began speaking slowly and condescendingly to Kelly, "He job is manual labor and he could not think of suggestions to help the working office. That is why he's not here. Anyone else? Jim?"

"Yeah," he dropped his hand from the air, "Why are there fourteen pictures of Brad Pitt on the wall?"

"Oh, that was me," Pam turned to Jim with a playful smile.

"Oh, and the streamers?" he added.

"Those were Angela," Phyllis interrupted as everyone looked above the room at the mess of green streamers tangled in the middle.

Pam furrowed her eyebrows, "Didn't you say green was a whorish color, Angela?"

"Yes," Angela replied monosyllabically and leaned back into her chair.

"Meow," Michael mimicked a cat scratching, "Seriously you guys, I'm going to have to start selling tickets." No one looked impressed.

"Alright, getting back to the ideas," Ryan picked the first paper off the top of the pile, "This one says 'We would get more work done if we didn't have so many conference meetings', which I can see truth in."

"Are you kidding me?" Michael scoffed again and crossed his arms in defense, "The conference meetings are how we connect to become more than coworkers," he interlaced his fingers together as an example, "Here it's more than business, it's personal."

"Well it shouldn't be," Ryan crumpled the paper and tossed it into the garbage can when a recycling bin was clearly in view. "From now on Michael, only one conference meeting a day."

"What" Michael exclaimed so loud, everyone thought he was going to jump from his seat, "That's bull-"

"Michael, it's not arguable, it's a demand, not a request," Ryan glanced over the next paper at him.

Michael slouched further back into his chair, "Well it sucks."

"This one," Ryan held up the piece of paper and crumpled it with one hand, "Said that we should have an accounting day," he tossed it to the waste basket, with two others following it, "Those said the same."

"Is it too much to ask for a little recognition?" Kevin asked from where he was seated at the back of the room.

"This one is just a bunch of bad things written about me, so I can only assume it's from Kelly," the pink piece of paper travelled through the air and into the bin.

"No more holidays that aren't recognized by the calendar," Ryan announced as he tossed the paper, "Did anyone write anything that pertains to their job?"

"I did," Dwight raised his hand.

"As did I," Andy added with a calm demeanor.

Ryan pulled out a paper, "You just wrote, to do whatever Dwight suggested."

"And I meant it," Andy replied.

"Well it," Ryan crumpled it, "Is going along with Dwight's into the garbage, because monitoring bathroom breaks and food intake has nothing to do with selling paper." With obvious frustration Ryan threw the paper balls across the room, to the gradually filling garbage can, and turned his attention to Michael, "Michael before I even look at yours, is it about communal showers?"

Michael covered his mouth with his hand in embarrassment and turned away from Ryan, "Yes."

Ryan tossed it, along with the last one.

"What was the last one?" Phyllis questioned softly.

"It was blank," Ryan added, then ran a hand through his hair, "Alright, Obviously none of you have ways to make your job easier. I tried with the Blackberries, and two of you sold them." From where Stanley was sitting engrossed in a crossword, a smile was seen on his lips, "You need to know you're your branches scheduled review time is coming up, and if you haven't met the standard outline, there's no future for this branch and drastic actions may be taken."

"But not that drastic," Michael stood up, "Just a warning."

"No Michael," Ryan shook his head, "I'm talking about a definite chance of downsizing, maybe even the closing of the branch."

The room grew silent as Michael's eyes grew large.


"It's the oldest trick in the book," Michael laughed into the camera, "Scare us so we'll do better. Ryan thinks his new ways are so successful, but he needs to know you win more friends by playing nicely with them, than putting on a mask and running after them with a machete," he stopped and his smile grew smaller, "I know that first hand."


"Do you really think they're going to downsize?" Phyllis whispered to Stanley from across her desk.

"For the second time, I do not care," Stanley mumbled as he reached for a pen to continue his work.

"Ryan used my idea," Dwight bragged to Jim, who sat with his head resting on his palm, watching Pam talk to Ryan at her desk, "Every time they ask for any ideas, I always say downsizing."

"I've got to agree with you there, compadre," Andy's chair squeaked as he turned to Dwight, "It was an excellent idea."

Dwight smirked, "I even told them who to cut."

Andy laughed and pumped his hand through the air, "Yes! Man you are so good. So who's the idiot who gets the axe?"

"You," Dwight added with a sneer. From behind him, Phyllis let a small laugh loose.

Andy nodded several times and placed a finger to his chin, "I don't know if I agree with you on that."

"Pam," Ryan stopped at the reception desk as he pulled on his coat, "Could you do me a favor and make sure that Michael reads the memo next time?"

"Oh he reads them," Pam reassured as she stopped typing a reminder for Michael, "I just don't know if he understands them all the time."

"Well could you make sure he reads the next one thoroughly?" Ryan asked his attention once again on his Blackberry.

"Yeah, I have a plan," she divulged, with a smile, she had just found a word search program on the internet.

Ryan put away his Blackberry, not even hearing a word of her last sentence, "Are you free tonight?"


Coming up- The final result of the party, and Corporate deals with Jim and Pam's relationship.