It was 4:37 AM, and Pam Beesly was wide awake.

She had been wide awake since watching Jim's car disappear into the the dark horizon.

Roy wasn't coming home, and she honestly hadn't given him a second thought.

When Jim had left, she had given a thorough effort to falling asleep. It was, after all, two in the morning. Not that she had anywhere to be in the morning.

Not that Roy would be home until late afternoon, anyway.

But after a solid hour of tossing and turning, she trudged back to the living room and popped on a random television channel. Pulling her feet up on the couch so that her knees could act as a table, she grabbed her sketchbook. Maybe finishing one of the pictures she had started earlier would stop the thoughts that were swimming around in her head.

As she added lines and shades and little bits of color, she realized that nothing could untangle the web that had been spinning since Jim had walked through her front door.

She was bored, so she called her friend. There was nothing wrong with that, was there?

Of course, he was a guy. And her fiance wasn't home. And it was the middle of the night. And he had left at almost three o'clock in the morning for the second weekend in a row.

Why did she feel such a welling of guilt in her stomach all of a sudden?

It was guilt, wasn't it?

She set her sketchbook down and picked up the bottle of disappearing ink, smiling as she cradled the small bottle in her hands. Her smile faded, and she got up, headed to the front door, and tucked the bottle safely into her purse.

Was she putting it in her purse to make sure it got to work safely, or to stop Roy from questioning her?

God, why was she even having these thoughts?!

She was marrying Roy. She was in love with Roy.

Wasn't she?

Plopping back to the couch in defeat, her mind wandered back to the conversation with her mother from earlier in the day.

She and Roy were just going through a rough patch. They would get through this. They would plan their wedding, get married, and live a happy life together.

But would they?

The more she thought about this "rough patch," the more she realized that the "patch" had been more like a gaping hole that had seemed to be ripping wide open since they had started dating.

Suddenly, her mind was drifting into the scrapbook of Pam and Roy. It began at a minor league hockey game. Never again would she cheer for the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins. Sure, Roy had apologized, but what had come of that? He never really "asked her out." It was more of a "so you're my girlfriend now, right? I can tell my friends that?" and she just sort of went along with it. Naive, 17 year old Pam had fallen into his trap and never escaped.

It was his idea for her to apply at Dunder Mifflin. They would see each other more, he had said. It was a way for them to "spend more time together."

And naive, 20 year old Pam had gone along with it. She had grown up only knowing, only loving Roy. When he proposed, it seemed like the right thing to do. They were high school sweethearts, right? They went to prom together, took graduation photos together, they worked together. Marriage was the next logical step. It hadn't even been that big of a deal. They were sitting in the basement of his parent's house, watching TV, when he had turned to her-eyes still on the television-and said, "Hey, so, you wanna get married?" And she had said yes. Immediately after, he had pumped his fists, shouted, "All right!" and gone out for a celebratory beer with the boys, leaving Pam alone in the Anderson's basement.

As her young adulthood flashed before her eyes, she felt tears suddenly stinging, which made her angry. She shouldn't be crying over spilt milk, she should be cleaning it up! But what did that even mean?

She couldn't just call off the wedding, could she? She still loved him. She still lived with him. They had set a date. They had...well, they had some things planned. He knew her better than anyone. Why was she even having these thoughts in the first place?

Why had the thought of calling off her wedding even crossed her mind? She couldn't do that-wouldn't do that. You didn't get engaged just to throw it all away. If you got engaged, you married that person. Her person was Roy. Her person had been Roy for years now. Although, the more time she had to think, the more she realized that she had never given herself the opportunity to find a different person. But that was because she was lucky! She had found her guy before they hit the real world! They got to experience all of that hard, "real life stuff" together! Going to college, buying Roy's first truck, signing the lease to their first house, getting their first adult jobs-she had literally grown up right alongside him. What more was she looking for?

As she brought her fingers up to wipe away the tears, the sparkle of her manicure caught her eye.

Jim.

He had complimented her manicure earlier tonight. And, not only had he complimented her, but he had even taken notice of what her nails normally looked like. He had made a comparison. Not once, in the years that she had been with Roy, had he ever said anythingabout her nails. Well, he had made a comment once about how he liked it when she left nail marks on his back, but that didn't count.

Jim.

Her friend, Jim.

Why was it so important that he noticed her nails?

As 5:30 drew nearer, and darknesses blended in with a sun that was fighting to stay asleep, she pushed the thoughts from her mind.

Jim had noticed her nail polish-so what? Kelly probably would on Monday, too.

Eventually, her exhaustion won the fight that her brain and her body had been having. As she gathered her art supplies to stow in their secret spot in the back of her closet, she found herself drawn back to the couch rather than to her bedroom. She pulled the blanket down from the back of the couch and wrapped herself into a cocoon. The right side of the couch cradled her head as she fell asleep.

Roy returned home around 4 PM the next day. They had a late dinner; he was still full from the concessions at the game. Pam gathered the dishes to begin washing. As the suds filled up the plugged sink, she noticed that Roy had flung himself onto the couch. And then she realized that this was normal. She'd been letting him get away with it for years.

His excuses were cyclical with his moods: "I'm tired," "I had a long day at work," "You just do it so much better than I do, babe." Tonight, she didn't feel like taking it.

"Hey, babe. You gonna help me with the dishes?" Ten bucks says "I'm tired from this weekend" is tonight's winner.

Without turning his head from the basketball game, Roy replied, "I'm kinda tired out from this weekend, babe. Think you could take care of it tonight? Promise I'll get ya back."

He always promised he'd "get her back." Did he ever really get her back though? Is this how marriage worked? You just "got each other back?" That didn't seem right.

"Yeah, I'm tired too, but the dishes still need to be done."

She had to almost shout to be heard over the TV. It shocked her that her voice could get that loud. It shocked her even more when Roy actually muted the television.

"Sorry, babe, I don't think I heard you. What was that?"

Dish rag in hand, she approached the end of the couch so that he could see her. She folded her arms to conceal the shaking of her hands.

"I said, I'm tired too. Dishes still have to be cleaned, Roy. It'll take us ten minutes."

Now, he was looking at her, remote still pointed at the television, eyebrows in his hairline.

"You serious, Pam?"

"Yeah, I'm serious. Come help me."

He made sure to be as loud, angry, and clanky at drying and putting away dishes as humanly possible. There was no cuddling on the couch. He mumbled an, "I'm going to bed," at some point, and disappeared into their bedroom. A satisfied smirk crept its way onto Pam's lips.

Good. Let him sulk.

With Roy asleep-much earlier than usual-Pam dug her sketchbook out of the closet. As she added the final details to the house sketch that she had been working on, her thoughts began to wander again to Jim.

Jim hadn't argued when she'd asked him to help with the dishes.

Wait.

Jim had started the dishes. She hadn't even asked him to. He had wanted to help her. In fact, he hadn't even asked her to dry the dishes. She had joined him of her own accord.

Washing dishes with Jim felt natural. Washing dishes with Roy was more of an actual chore than doing them alone.

Satisfied with her drawing, she packed up her colored pencils and carefully tore the image from the binding, thinking about the conversation she had with Jim earlier that morning.

She was going to frame this one.

The little house, sitting on Monroe Avenue. The garage light bulb that was burnt out because the owner had refused to change it. "I'll get to it tomorrow," he'd said, four days ago. The reluctant footsteps that led to the car that had been parked in the driveway. The edge of a little, red car, slowly leaving the page. The clock inside, barely visible, reading 2:37 AM.