Fuck Valentine's Day.
Jim wasn't one to ever really have a disdain for holidays. They were an excuse to hang out with family and friends, enjoy good food and drink, and forget about his worries for a day or two. But today, after hearing those words trickle off of Roy Anderson's lips, after letting the images of her going back to their home and spending the rest of her night underneath that neanderthal cloud every part of his brain, his animosity for all things pink and heart-related coursed through his veins like a poison.
Tonight, he was getting unabashadly, unashamedly, obliteratedly shit-faced.
He didn't care if it burned her face into his consciousness, etched her giggles into his ear drums, carved her touch into his skin. He was going to drink until he blacked out. He'd call into work sick tomorrow. At this point, he was beyond caring.
As he drove home from the liquor store with way more than enough beer and whiskey for the 3 other people who would join him around the card table that evening, he scolded himself.
He knew, had known for years, that Pam was engaged to Roy.
Knew that Pam lived with Roy.
Knew that Pam and Roy, like most couples who were engaged to be married and living under one roof, probably had sex quite often.
But he had never come face to face with that fact. Never made the conscious effort to think about it, to imagine what happened inside that cozy little house on Monroe Avenue.
In his own little world, Pam and Roy were roommates. Their three-year-long engagement resembled a housing contract at a dormitory. Eventually, the lease would end, and she would be freed. In Jim-World, Pam and Roy's "relationship" outside of work didn't exist.
He cringed as he recalled Roy's pithy, portentous words that more than cut him like a knife, but split him open, shattering every protective shield he had used to create his fantasy world wherein Pam and Roy were not a physical couple.
"Let's get you home, and you are gonna get the best sex of your life."
He wasn't even cocky, as the words had rolled off his tongue. It was as if Roy just knew that he was going to take Pam home and satisfy her every need. Like it was his job. Like it was a fact; having sex with Pam was something he was born to do.
As soon as that reality had seeped into Jim's world, had broken the mold of safety that he had been living in, he couldn't handle it.
Years of protecting himself shattered in one moment.
He hadn't even stuck around to see the reaction she would have to his Valentine's Day card.
He couldn't.
He'd barely made eye contact with her as he wished her a pathetic, "Happy Valentine's Day," and exited the building, in a rush to push every memory of that day out and drown himself into oblivion.
He was already 5 beers down when Paul, Shawn, and Tyler arrived. A quick, "Fuck Valentine's Day!" toast, and the stereotypical "man's night" had quickly eluded any trace of a female presence, whether physical or ghost-like.
In stark contrast to the previous weekend, Jim was very quickly losing money, the alcohol hazing his judgment and creating foolish error as he slid yet another bill across the table. It was Tyler who had spoken up first, his, "Halpert, you doin' okay tonight, pal?" barely registering as concern to Jim, who had polished off 8 beers and had moved onto whiskey, more slugging back than sipping going on as his friends all eyed him with tense caution.
"Man, I'm good, so good." The words tangled on his tongue, tripping as he tried to convince his friends that he was, in fact, okay.
"You sure, buddy?" Paul scoffed, fingers jutting at the recyclables piled near Jim's end of the table. "You've got yourself quite the stash there for a Tuesday night."
Suddenly, he felt three pairs of eyes on him, and the warmth in his cheeks had little to do with the alcohol coursing through his system. Staring at the amber liquid that he cradled in a glass, he was suddenly hyper aware of how embarrassed he was. He was undoubtedly drunk, and his emotions were scripted in Sharpie all over his face. Mouth agape, he let a strangled sigh escape his throat, before liquid became words that poured past his lips.
"I jus' really miss Pam."
His shoulders hunched, chin nearly resting on his chest. He was deflated, drained, just like that.
Whenever Jim allowed himself to open up and truly commit to a woman, he often kept those feelings between himself and that woman, at least for a little while. He enjoyed the intimacy of getting to know someone without everyone else's opinions interfering. But the case of Pamela Morgan Beesly was entirely different. The feelings he had for her transcended limits he hadn't even known existed before he'd entered the Dunder Mifflin offices on his first day, and had seen her honey curls and her tongue clenched between her teeth as she giggled at something Michael had said.
But his situation with Pam was just so far out of reach, so far beyond his control, that he had to talk to someone about it.
The only people in his life who knew about his unrequited love for Pam were his parents, his brother Tom, and Mark.
His parents and brother knew because, after his first day at his "first big boy job" (thanks, mom and dad), the Halpert clan had thrown a "congratulatory dinner" of sorts. When asked about the highlight of the day, Jim had proudly announced that he had met the woman he was going to marry.
Of course, the following weekend, he had broken the news dejectedly to his parents that their future daughter-in-law was, in fact, not the Dunder Mifflin receptionist. But now they knew. And every time Jim brought up Pam's name, poor Larissa Halpert's heart broke deeper and deeper for her son.
His brother had been a casualty.
Mark knew because they lived together, and someone had to be there for him on the days when Roy would come up to the office and surprise Pam with lunch, or Roy would come up early to take Pam home and they would share inside jokes and sneak an innocent kiss when no one was looking. No one but Jim, who had to force himself to look away.
And Michael?
Jim had ostensibly professed his feelings for Pam to Michael, right there on the same boat where mere hours prior, he had almost done the same with Pam.
Michael had told him not to quit. "Engaged ain't married."
But Michael Scott was also the same man who had forced everyone in their office to tape racial identities to their foreheads and portray stereotypical-and downright offensive-characters as a game.
So, probably not the best person to be taking advice from.
As Jim stared at the eyes that were fixed on his sad, pitiful presence, he had the sudden realization that none of these men had a clue what he was going through.
And as the retorts of, "Pam? Who's Pam?" and, "Well why don't you call her up?" echoed off the walls of his kitchen, he suddenly didn't care how deeply depressed he was, or how certain he was that Pam was, right now, in the arms of her lover.
He needed to hear her voice.
"Should I call Pam, you guys?" he slurred, fingers itching at the cell phone on the table in front of him.
"It's the day of love, Halpert! Call your girl up; have her join us."
"Really?" His eyes bugged out of his head. To the casual observer, it was the expression of a drunk man gasping at the suggestion of his friends. To Jim, it was the sudden thought that Pam could very soon be seated next to him at his very own kitchen table.
"Yeah, man. The more the merrier! Otherwise, your drunk, pansy ass is going to be miserable all night, and I didn't sign up for miserable," Shawn chortled.
Jim's returned laugh was far too over-expressive, but he used it to mask the nervous cloud that had suddenly overtaken his entire body. He snapped his cell phone open and closed several times.
"You guys, Pam is just, she is so great, you're gonna lllove her. I promise. She ca- probably take all your money in poker, too. And she's so fun! You'regon- a love her. Oh my god."
His friends chuckled, nodded, and sipped on their drinks, taking a pause in their game as they waited for Jim to make the call.
Gulping, he flipped his phone open, hitting speed dial number one, and pressing the phone nervously to the tip of his tomato-red ear.
"Hello?"
He wasn't sure why he was so surprised that she had answered, but his enthusiasm could not be contained as he practically yelled, "BEESLY! Oh my god, what's UP?!"
The men around the table shook their heads in laughter and dealt the next hand, whispering jokes about their love-sick friend as cards were spread on the table.
"Not too much, actually," she giggled back. He swore that her giggle, if given the chance, could cure cancer. "Jim Halpert, are you drunk?"
His face spanned the warm shades of the color wheel, and suddenly he was tugging nervously at the collar of his t-shirt.
"Um, kind of, maybe a little. Pam, are you drunk?" She could picture his faux-serious expression, the tone in his voice a dead give-away.
"No, no I'm not, unfortunately," she giggled in response. "So, my inebriated friend, what are you doing so drunk on a Tuesday night?"
Even in his state of mind, he was able to refrain from spilling the beans that he had been using the alcohol as a means to wipe her memory from every corner of his being. To destroy the evidence of just mere hours ago, when images of her and her fiance painted the insides of his eyelids, driving him mad.
"It's Valentine's Day, Beesly! Me and the boys are drinkin' the night away! We're paintin' my apartment red!" He flailed his free arm enthusiastically, rendering a bag of potato chips helpless on the floor.
"Speak for yourself, Halpert!" He wasn't sure which one of his friends' voices had entered the background of his conversation, nor did he care.
"Oh really? That sounds like fun."
The kitchen around him disappeared. He was imagining her lounging on the couch in her living room, her body cradled against the armrest, feet propped along its back, her fingers toying with the curls in her hair.
He wasn't too far off. As visions of Jim and friends gathered in his kitchen, alcohol pouring, having a good time swirled in Pam's mind, she had found herself needing to take a seat at the kitchen table. Her fingers nervously tangled in the gold chain around her neck.
"Pam! It is so much fun! Bu- it would be so much more fun if you were here. You should definitely be here. So you should come over. Do you wanna come over?"
Part of her wanted to giggle; he was very healthily drunk, after all, and she had truly only ever seen him the tiniest bit tipsy. This new territory was exciting for her.
But a larger part of her honed in on his words. It would be so much more fun if you were here. You should definitely be here. Do you wanna come over?
Her eyes scanned over her apartment slowly, taking in its true emptiness. Roy was gone. Silence resonated almost as loudly as her heart did thumping inside her chest. Suddenly, the void that she noticed was screaming to be filled, and the only piece that could complete that puzzle was making incessant, albeit humorous, noises on the other end of the receiver.
Jim.
She couldn't make sense of it, or rather, didn't want to make sense of the fact that her body, her mind, her very soul, were all aching to be near to him, for him to bring her comfort, to make her feel safe in a night that was otherwise falling apart. Roy had unraveled her strings when he chose to walk out that door. She wanted, needed Jim to stitch her back up.
Her silence worried him. He shouldn't have called. This was a mistake. She was probably laying in bed with Roy right now, their slick bodies warm against one another. They'd have a cigarette and a laugh when she hung up, words passed about "poor, lovesick Halpert." He had to stand, the lack of blood flow to his head suddenly rendering him dizzy. He was pacing. He was sweating. He was about to hang up the phone and throw himself drunkenly into traffic when her words, however small, saved him.
"I'll be over in twenty minutes."
