Warning: Entanglement Hazard (part II)
Series Title: warning_labels
Series Authors: annakovsky, honey_wheeler, kyrafic, and obsession_inc
Chapter Title: Warning : Entanglement Hazard
Chapter Author: obsession_inc
Fandom: The Office (US)
Pairing: Jim/Pam
Rating: NC-17
Words: 12,000
Summary: Set during Dwight's Speech, Take Your Daughter To Work Day, and Michael's Birthday. This is in two parts, due to it taking place over three episodes and LJ not allowing entries over a certain length.
Notes: annakovsky, kyrafic, and honey_wheeler brainstormed, plotted, betaed, encouraged, ass-kicked, spoon-fed, and hand-held on this one, above and beyond the call of duty. I absolutely could not have done it without them.
Part I is here.
Part II
Some people bring over cassaroles in times of crisis; Pam draws. She thought about drawing Kevin as a rotund knight slaying a skin-cancer dragon, but she got stuck trying to figure out how to envision skin cancer as a dragon, so that went in the trash. Once, way back, Kevin had said that he thought snow globes were funny, so Pam draws a little picture for him of the Accounting department in a snow globe, using a fresh Sharpie. Angela and Kevin are easy to caricature-- all straight lines and angles for Angela, all circles and curves for Kevin-- but Oscar doesn't have any easily simplified features, so his Sharpie-sketch turns out looking like a short, irritable Barack Obama. She picks it up by the corners and holds it up for the camera, and Jim comes over to the reception desk so he can take a look.
It's his third trip up to her desk today, which means that they're almost back to their pre-unpleasantness average (not counting lunch or breaks or any incidental meetings). Not that she's counting. It's nice to have him back; it's nice to have her friend again. It's like-- she barely dares to think this, but still-- it's like they've resolved the sex thing that had been lurking under their friendship from the very beginning. Maybe this is it; maybe they've gotten it out of their systems, and everything's going to be better from here on out. It's more than the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel-- it's like the tunnel hadn't just been dark, but full of water, and Pam's been swimming without a breath for forever, and now she's suddenly broken through into an unexpected pocket of air that's saved her from drowning.
Jim leans over the counter to get a better look at the picture. "Needs snow," he says, chewing thoughtfully on one of Michael's birthday doughnuts.
She holds up the Sharpie and shrugs. "Got anything more snow-colored?"
Jim purses his lips in concentration, then nods and taps on the desktop counter. "Gimme," he orders, and when Pam obediently slides the picture over, he brushes the powdered sugar off his doughnut, letting it fall onto the picture. "There you go. Accountants Under Glass, Pamela Beesly, 2006. Sharpie Fine Point Marker and confectioner's sugar on recycled copier paper; 8 1/2 by 11 inches. Suitable for framing but not for human consumption." He loops a grin at her.
She bursts out laughing and takes the picture back, careful not to smear the sugar. "It's a lucky thing you didn't pick a jelly doughnut."
"Oh, Pam," he tuts. "Luck has nothing to do with it. This is art."
"This is breakfast," she counters, "and you got it all over my desk."
Jim looks down. "Oops." He brushes ineffectually at the white flecks of sugar. It gets stuck to his fingers, and he makes a motion like he's going to wipe it off on his pants, but stops just in time and makes a face. "Oh, well," he says, and before Pam has time to register what's happening, he has his hand up by his mouth and is licking the sugar off with small flicks of his tongue, like a fussy cat.
She stares, a sense memory washing through her of that tongue on her mouth, under her jaw, working his way down her stomach.
"What?" he asks, pausing with one finger right by his open mouth.
Pam shakes her head wordlessly, but the thoughts must be plain as day on her face because Jim's eyes darken and she can see his adam's apple bob as he swallows. Her heart is beating, beating, but she can't remember the last time she took a breath. "Um," she manages at last, "I've got napkins, if you want..."
"Sure," he says, his eyes not leaving hers. Their fingers brush when she hands him the napkin, which makes them both jump a little, like a spark of static electricity. It looks like he's about so say something else, but then Dwight comes marching up with a clipboard, snapping at her about the exact freezer temperature for maintaining the proper firmness of an ice cream cake, and Jim just gives her a look she can't quite translate and goes back to his desk.
She excuses herself to go to the bathroom and sits in one of the stalls for what feels like forever, reminding herself that this was just a memory. They'll have those, now; there's no way to have a sexual relationship with someone and not occasionally remember what it was like. This is normal.
She presses her flushed face against the cool tile wall and wonders if it's also normal to feel so much like she's lying to herself.
* * * *
Jim has his hand so far back on the Rite-Aid shelf that he can feel the edge digging into his armpit, and he's already trying to think of ways that sixty-eight packages of Cup o' Noodles would not be anticlimactic when his fingers finally brush against what must be the last one in the store. "Aha!" he exclaims, and hauls it out in triumph. "Sixty-nine."
"Oh, thank God." Pam lets out her breath in a whoosh, like she'd been holding it. "Are there any left in there, or do you think we've cleaned them out?"
Jim hunkers down so that the shelf is on eye-level. "I think that's it," he says. "Wow. Is that cutting it close, or what?"
"Must be fate," Pam agrees. She tucks her arms around herself and smiles, and he smiles back, and they just stand there for a minute smiling over a cart full of an absurd number of cup o' noodles.
"What else?" he asks, and starts pushing the cart again, leaning over to steer with his forearms, which coincidentally puts his head right around the same height as Pam's. The camera guy has wandered off, probably bored out of his mind by the cups o' noodles counting; maybe he's outside getting some establishing shots. It leaves them alone for a heady moment, free of any interference. "Cupcakes? Candy? Pornography?"
"Well, porn, obviously," Pam says, "but we'll have to get that somewhere else. In the meantime, I think... M&Ms. Lots of them."
He looks at her, and can't help smiling. "Oh, yeah, good point-- we need more than he can fit in his mouth at one time, so..."
"A party-pack it is, then." She stops suddenly. "Wait, weren't they in the last aisle?"
"No idea." Jim stands straight up and starts to turn the cart around. It moves ponderously, squeaking; one of the wheels feels like it isn't turning. He tugs on it and makes a tortured face.
"Just leave it there," Pam says.
"But--" Jim looks at the cart, blocking most of the narrow aisle, and that's when her small, cool hand slips into his and tugs gently.
"Come on," she tells him, grinning up at him with a warmth in her eyes that makes his breath catch. He lets her lead him away, her hand still tucked into his, tugging at him like he's a recalcitrant puppy. She keeps peeking back over her shoulder for long seconds with one side of her mouth still curled up in that lopsided grin, looking just plain happy, and it's been so long since he's seen her look like that, he'd do anything to keep that smile on her face. He doesn't understand what they're doing, or what she's thinking, or why he can't do a damn thing to resist her. He just knows that he'd follow her anywhere.
Pam's fingers start to loosen when they get near all the big bags of candy, but he hangs on, not ready to let go just yet. She looks up at him quickly, eyebrows raised in joking protest, and Jim squeezes her hand in a friendly manner. She squeezes back, swinging their entwined hands between them like they're warming up a jump-rope, and she's smiling, and he just can't help it-- he cups her hand in both of his, lifting it up and holding it just under his chin, bowing his head. He closes his eyes for a moment, breathing in the fresh melon scent of her hand lotion, before he presses his lips to her knuckles, once, very softly, and once again.
"Jim." Her voice is low, and it sounds like a warning. He opens his eyes and finds her staring right at him, a panicky, stricken expression on her face. "Don't," she says, but her voice falters on the word, and she blushes and looks down as she pulls her hand away.
This is the point where he knows he should apologize, should stop and back up. They've been on this road before, and it'll just end up going over a cliff again-- only this time, there won't be any chance of survival. If he just lets this go, if he keeps things simple, if he doesn't give in to this self-destructive impulse, then maybe he can move on and they can stay friends after June tenth. If not--
It's a choice. He can't pretend it's not. He won't be able to pretend, later, that he didn't know better, or couldn't stop himself. It's a choice.
There's a crash at the far end of the aisle, and they both jump; Pam lets out a little shriek. Two carts are nose-to-nose with each other, one manned by an angry old lady with a Bronx accent and a lot to say, and the other by an old guy barely taller than his cart who appears to still be pushing, stubbornly trying to shove the noisy lady from the Bronx out of his way. The camera guy walks into view, clearly focusing on the excitement.
Jim looks back at Pam, alarmed. "Did he--"
"No, I think we're okay." She holds his gaze for a moment, her eyes solemn and a little sad, but that soft warmth starts creeping in again. "Just-- later, all right?"
"Yeah," he agrees, and leans over to get the M&Ms. "Later."
* * * *
The last time Pam went skating was also at a birthday party, but in that case it'd been for her friend Lindsay Brauner, who'd been turning twelve. All Pam can really remember about it is scooting around the perimeter, clinging to the wall, while everyone else sailed past like they'd been born skating. Since that's not really a fond memory, it's really amazing that Jim could coax her out on the ice at all today. Which was-- well. Nice. Really nice.
The thing is, she'd forgotten how sore skating makes her ankles, so she really doesn't stay out on the ice all that long. She sits on one of the long benches at rinkside and fumbles off her gloves to unlace her skates, halfway watching in her peripheral vision as everyone glides around the rink in elliptical courses, like comets in mittens and scarves.
One of the comets lets its orbit decay, slowing to a stop by the wall just in front of her. She knows even before she looks up that it's Jim. "Hey," he says, pushing the door open. "What happened to the next Oksana Baiul?"
"Feet hurt," she explains. "They're not used to the whole skating thing." She gets the last loop of the lace unhooked and peels the long tongue down; when she gets her foot out of the ten-ton skate, it feels practically weightless by comparison. "Ohhhh, that's better," she sighs, and gets to work on the other one.
Jim clambers off the ice and sits next to her, balancing his feet on the back ends of his skate blades. "You were really getting the hang of the whole skating thing near the end, there."
She snorts. "Yeah, well. Yay for not falling on my butt!"
"No, I'm serious. You did good." He wags his skates from side to side in ponderous arcs and then lets them both flop inwards, the tips of the blades clashing together heavily. "I never thought I'd say this, but I've actually enjoyed Michael's birthday this year."
"Me too," Pam agrees. "I mean, well, since Kevin doesn't have cancer. Otherwise I would have had to downgrade my rating." She pries her other foot out of the skate with only three-quarters of the laces undone, unable to wait any longer, and heaves a sigh of relief. "I think my skates are a little too small."
"Nah, they all feel like that." Jim looks down, watches her toes wiggling inside her socks. "Anyway, I think Kelly said something about you guys going off to get some kind of fancy pedicures tomorrow, so I guess you'll have a chance to get any damage repaired."
Pam claps a hand to her forehead. "Oh, God, I forgot all about that."
"Really? I thought you would've been looking forward to it." He lifts his eyebrows solemnly. "Not every woman gets the chance to have a whole day-- a whole day, mind you-- in the company of Kelly Kapoor."
"Hey, it's still better than my original plans for the weekend."
"Which were...?"
"Watching the Changing Spaces marathon and tying bows on a couple hundred little bags of birdseed."
"Oh, I don't know," Jim says. "On the one hand, quality cable programming; on the other--"
"No, she's okay, I mean, it's just--" She stops and presses her cold feet together at the ankle, bites her lip; she starts twice, trying to work up to forming the words, and finally just blurts out, "Roy's out of town this weekend."
Jim goes very still. His eyes flick over to her and his mouth opens slightly like he's having trouble breathing. "Oh," he says, and leans forward, elbows on knees. He stares into space, nodding softly, taps his fingers together a few times, and says, "Oh," again, very quietly.
"Yeah, so..." Pam laughs weakly. She's kind of having trouble breathing, herself. "Um, he dropped me off at work this morning and took the truck, so. Kind of why I've been using you as my personal chauffeur all day."
There's a long moment of silence, punctuated by the slicing sounds of people skating by. Pam can hear Meredith guffawing and Kevin's droning voice, somewhere on the other side of the rink, far away. She breathes carefully, slow and shallow, trying to slow her heart and keep it from battering its way through her ribs.
Finally, Jim makes a soft sound, almost like a chuckle, and turns to look at her, a smile slowly curving his mouth. "I have to ask, Beesley," he asks, "is this your way of asking for a ride home?"
"What?" she exclaims. "N-- well, not exactly, but if you're offering--"
"Me? Oh, no." Jim waves a hand languidly. "But I'm sure Dwight would be more than happy to--"
"You are such a jerk," she laughs, and bumps her shoulder against him. When she puts her hand down, after, it ends up right next to his, barely touching.
They stay that way, not really looking at each other, until Michael comes to a dramatic hockey-league halt in front of them and hollers, "Come on, come on, it's time for presents! For Kevin!"
* * * *
The problem with having Pam in his car is that Jim is conditioned, now, to associate having her in his car with sex. Well, hand-jobs, blow-jobs, whatever; the point is that the lizard part of his brain has done the math and come up with Pam + car = orgasm, so giving Pam a ride home puts Jim in the position of trying to keep from getting an erection, every single moment, and still manage to drive. It's not easy, but he's trying his best, because even if this feels like it's going the way he thinks it's going, he's not sure if it's really going to go that way, and even if it does, he's not sure if he wants it to, and so frankly this is complicated enough without showing all his cards by getting a boner.
He's not getting any answers from Pam, that's for sure. She's been quiet the whole time, looking out the window, her hands locked together in her lap. Whatever's going on in her brain, it's not showing on her face.
For the sake of his own mental health, he runs through the options for dinner. Currently the groceries are at low ebb, since he usually does his shopping on the weekends, but he thinks he might have a box of mac 'n' cheese left, and possibly hot dogs. Hot dogs and mac 'n' cheese, together, are possibly the greatest culinary invention to come out of the twentieth century, so... not a bad plan, really.
"Left here," Pam says softly.
"Yeah, I know." He bites his tongue before he adds I've been here before, remember?, and turns left onto Pam's street. She doesn't prompt him about which house it is, so apparently the message got through without saying it out loud. He parks in front of the house and, against his better judgement, goes ahead and turns the car completely off. For a long, tense moment the only sound is the ticking noise of the motor cooling down.
"So," Pam says, staring down at her hands.
"So," he echoes.
She looks out the window, at the dark house. "Um... can I ask you a favor?"
"Sure," he says, trying to keep his tone light, trying to distract her from whatever is looming behind her eyes. "As long as it doesn't have anything to do with breaking into the Gotham Museum of Natural History to steal dinosaur bones for reanimation, because I promised Batman I wouldn't do that anymore."
Pam laughs a little. "Well, maybe I'll talk you into it next time."
"And make me go back on my word?" He sighs dramatically. "Oh, Pam. Will you never let me escape this life of crime?"
"It's terrible, I know," she says. "Seriously, though, could you come inside? Just for a minute?"
Jim's heart jumps. It's insanely difficult to avoid making assumptions about where this is going, but he's doing his best. "Need some help checking your coat closet for ax murderers?"
"Oh, yeah," she laughs, looking down at her lap. "You know how it is in Scranton these days; if it's not bears, it's pirates, if it's not pirates..."
"...It's ax murderers," he finishes, and smiles in spite of himself. "Yeah, okay. I don't think I'd be able to live with myself if I let you go in by yourself and you ended up getting ambushed by robot ninjas or something."
Pam opens her door and climbs out. "You're the last of the true gentlemen, Mr. Halpert," she says over her shoulder.
Jim can't help looking at the driveway as they walk to the door. He tells himself that it won't matter if Roy is actually home; all Jim's going to do is wave a baseball bat at a few shifty-looking closets, so if there's a pickup truck in that driveway he'll just get to go home to his gourmet meal of Kraft and Hormel products that much sooner. He looks at the driveway anyway. It's empty.
Pam stops after she's unlocked the door and looks up at him impishly; he lifts his fists, assumes his best battle-ready expression, and nods. She nods back and throws the door open. No robot ninjas are in evidence.
"Well," Pam says. "So far, so good." She reaches around the edge of the doorway, fishing for the light switch.
"Careful." Jim keeps his fists up, craning his neck to peer inside. "Those ax murderers can be tricky bastards."
"Bears," she corrects him, leading the way through the door. "Or pirates."
"Those, too," he agrees, and closes the door behind them.
Pam puts her coat and purse on the couch as she walks past it. "Hello?" she calls. "Any ax murderers, bears, pirates, or ninjas--"
"Robot ninjas."
"--or robot ninjas, this is your last chance! Come out, come out, wherever you are!"
They pause, and listen. Nothing.
"I think we're okay," Pam says, and turns around with a bright grin.
Oh, that smile. Jim feels a hollow ache settle into his chest just from looking at her. He swallows. "I don't know," he says at last. "I mean, it seems like we are, I just don't want to be wrong."
Her head tips a little to one side as she gives him a careful look. "We are," she assures him. "Everything turned out fine. Right?"
It's rapidly becoming apparent that they're not talking about imaginary intruders anymore, and it makes Jim's stomach twist sickly. They've never discussed things before, not ever, and he doesn't really want to start now, but they're kind of in the middle of it already so it's a little late to back out. "Right," he agrees. "And we're okay."
"Right." She nods a few times more than is necessary. "I like things being okay."
"Me, too."
"It's nice. It's nice, and it's fun, and it's... okay." Pam flicks a quick look at him, and says, very softly, "I don't want to have things not be okay again. You know?"
"I know." Jim feels his stomach twist again. Mac 'n' cheese, he reminds himself. Hot dogs. He has dinner to look forward to; this is not, not, not a letdown. "Better to just have things... stay okay."
"As long as it is okay," she says softly. "But what if it's not? What if what we think is okay now turns out not to be okay later? What if okay is--" She breaks off abruptly and presses her hands to her head. "Oh God, the more I say that word the less it sounds like it's even English."
He tries to laugh, but nothing comes out. He's still back at the what if. "If?" he manages. "What--?"
Pam makes a strange sound, frustrated and sad and sweet all at the same time, and gives him a look to match. "Jim," she says, her voice catching, "I--"
And then she's kissing him.
In a way, part of him has been waiting for this all day, sensing it in the air like a storm coming-- not so much knowing it would happen as knowing that the right conditions existed. Jim is still caught completely off-guard. He'd given up on ever being able to touch her again; every morning for weeks he's been waking up almost happy before he catches himself and remembers that this weird thing of theirs is over. He knows he shouldn't, he knows that he'll regret this sooner rather than later, but he feels like he does those first waking moments, before the reality check, and it's too much to give up.
He wraps his arms around her waist, pulling her whole body against his and off the ground a little-- she must be up on the tips of her toes-- and just kisses her, kisses her, kisses her. She's got her hands fisted in his hair and is pulling him closer, making these delicious little noises in the back of her throat, and he groans into her mouth in response.
Pam shifts her balance and her foot comes down right on his pinkie toe; he yelps. "Sorry," she murmurs against his jaw.
"Mm," he says, dismissing it, and works a hand down to cup her ass and pull her up higher. He can feel her mouth, pressed against his neck, twist into a smile, and she starts shaking slightly. It takes a second to work out that somehow, Pam's got the giggles. "Something funny?" he asks.
"Robot ninjas," she tells him, and laughs outright, a big open-mouthed delighted laugh that makes his heart flip over pleasantly. "I had no idea what a menace they were."
"Well," he admits, "the alternative was something like 'why, Miss Beesly, are you planning on taking advantage of me?' but I was afraid it might dissuade you."
"Probably," she agrees, and pulls his mouth down to hers again. Jim pushes her up against a wall, because experience has taught him that when making out with someone more than a whole head shorter than he is, the only two ways to avoid neck strain are to either lie down or involve a sturdy wall. Pam makes a sort of hrmph! noise and pulls back. "Hold on, now," she informs him, "the wall thing was not so great last time." She's smiling, though, and doesn't seem mad.
"Among other things," he agrees, kissing her neck. "Don't worry. Not the plan this time."
"There's a plan?" she asks breathlessly, and hooks one of her legs around his, the better to grind her hips against his. The erection he'd been fighting all night is back with a vengeance, and his new problem is trying to avoid coming in his pants like he was fourteen all over again.
He's grasping desperately for a bare minimum of coherence, and the way she's moving against him is not making that easy. "Kind of a plan," he gasps. "More like a concept. Thinking of seeing if we're any good at this if we go slow."
"Guess we'll find out," Pam moans, almost directly into his ear, from where she's nipping at his jaw. "We've got time."
The thought flashes through his mind that they're alone, that Roy isn't coming back tonight, that they have all night-- and oh, God, he almost loses his fucking mind thinking about it. Hours of touching, no rush, no interruptions, just her, with him. All night.
"New plan," he says, and lets her slide down to a standing position again. "Less wall, more b-- more lying down." He hopes that he made it over that little fumble without Pam catching it, but she stiffens in his arms and he knows she caught the half-spoken bed. For anyone else in the midst of foreplay, a normal word: for a guy standing in the house where his occasional lover lives with her fiancé, not so much. Shit.
When Jim looks at her, Pam is chewing on her lower lip, staring fixedly at his chin. He steps back a little, so he's not so much holding her as gently grasping her elbows, and watches as a stormy, impenetrable thought process rages across her face. Finally she looks down and slides one of her hands down his arm until she's holding his hand.
Silently, she leads him into the unfamiliar territory of the hallway. They pass a bathroom with sea-green tile, a door that appears to be a linen closet, and then they're in the bedroom. Pam flips on the light, drops his hand, and gives him a look like she's challenging him to say something.
The place is a mess. Not just the stuff jumbled around on the dresser, the unmade bed, and the pile of clothes near the laundry hamper-- that, he's used to, that's normal life as far as he's concerned. The part that really strikes him is the quiet hand of design peeking out from underneath the debris: the selection of the furniture (Target cheap, but all matching, with nice lines), the soft colors of the sheets and the quilt, the framed watercolors, the way the walls have been painted not just with the sky-blue base color, but with a layer of misty white fading in mid-way to the ceiling, slowly eclipsing the blue. So much care has been taken with the creation of this room that the careless way it's being treated seems not just callous, but mean.
Jim reaches out and touches the frame of one of the watercolors. "I like it. Yours?" he asks.
She nods, still silent, watching him like she's waiting for something specific. He looks at her, trying to puzzle out what she's after, but the shutters are down and it's tough to read her. Is she waiting for him to admit what a big step this is? Does she expect him to say something stupid about Roy? Does she want him to reassure her that he's not expecting anything to change with the wedding and all?
He takes a deep breath and plunges in. "So, Mickey Mouse is in the middle of a nasty divorce with Minnie Mouse," he says. "Mickey's arguing with the judge, and the judge says, 'Look, I'm sorry, Mickey, but you can't just divorce Minnie because you think she's a little crazy.' And Mickey says, 'Your Honor, I never said she was a little crazy, I said she was fucking Goofy!"
Pam just stares at him like he's insane, and she shakes her head back and forth three or four times before the corners of her mouth turn up and she's laughing helplessly. "Okay... um-- is one of us supposed to be Goofy in this scenario?"
"Yes," Jim says solemnly. "Me."
"I can totally see that," she laughs, and goes up on tip-toe to give him a single soft kiss. "C'mere, Goofy," she orders, and starts unbuttoning his shirt.
* * * *
If Pam thinks about this too hard, the guilt is going to crush her. She'd kissed Roy good-morning in this room, on this bed, less than twelve hours ago. He had cupped a hand around the back of her head and breathed his morning breath on her face when their lips parted, and then he'd grinned and tweaked her breast gently. She's trying not to think of that right now, with Jim in their bed, because the two scenes start to overlap in her head and she finds herself comparing them, putting the two men in the same role and... and...
It's one thing to compare Roy and Jim before, when one meant a future and the other meant a quick fuck here and there, but this is different. Dangerous. She's not sure if she's ever going to be able to draw sharp lines around their roles again, and, worse, she's not sure if she wants to. She wants Jim in her bed, with all that entails, even if-- God help her-- that means that he's taking Roy's place.
It's hilarious that for all the sex and all the emotional drama, she's only seen Jim naked twice before, both times under harsh lighting conditions. She's never seen him naked with the lights off, hovering over her like this, barely visible, outlined in soft charcoal shades and highlighted with faint yellow tones from the streetlight down the block.
"Touch me," she tells him. Obediently, he runs a hand down her side, over her hip, back up and over her stomach. It tickles, and she rolls sideways, swatting his hand away. "Hey, that's not what I meant."
"You didn't specify," Jim says, kissing a slow path down the slope of one breast.
"You knew what I meant." She doesn't say, You always know.
He teases her nipple with his tongue, brushing his hand down her side again. "I figured that the rule was, if you didn't specify, I got to choose."
Pam reaches for his hand and presses it against her thigh. "Please."
"In due time," he promises, and kisses his way across to her other nipple. His hand stays on her thigh, excruciatingly close to where she wants it, his fingers moving in languid patterns and making stray sparks shoot up her spine. Once, the back of his hand brushes against her and her hips buck involuntarily.
"Please," she says, more forcefully.
"Here?" he asks in a too-knowing voice, and traces a single finger lightly over her, just barely stirring the hair.
She presses her head back into the pillow. "Oh, God, you tease."
"Shh." His hand moves up again, more pressure this time, but still nowhere near what she needs. He dips a finger into her, slow and shallow. "We've got time," he whispers, and moves that finger lightly around her clit.
"You're going to kill me," Pam grumbles, and moves her hand down his stomach, feeling blindly for his cock, determined to make him get on with the program.
"Hey, now." Jim moves his hips away from her. He kisses her neck, down low by her collarbone, tickling her nose with his hair; she purses her lips and blows the hair away, trying not to sneeze. "Patience, young padawan."
"Don't get dorky on me," she says. "I'm not-- oh--" She cuts herself off with a gasp as Jim slides his finger inside her a little further and brushes her clit with his thumb at the same time.
"Like I said," he murmurs, biting lightly at her shoulder, "I want to see if we're good at this when we take it slow." Two fingers now, gliding in and out with insanely slow strokes, pausing at the top of each stroke to circle her clit.
"We're good, we're good," she babbles, pulling at his shoulders, digging her heels into the bed and pushing up. "Please, Jim, come on--"
His fingers slip deep into her and he groans, pressing his face into her neck. "Oh, God, you're so-- oh, Pam--"
"Please."
Jim shifts his weight, moving over her, the bed squeaking a too-familiar tune. "Shit, where's the--"
She leans over, half-trapped by the way her legs are tangled with his, and fumbles at the nightstand for a condom. "I got it." She's careful to toss the wrapper back behind the bed, where Roy always does in spite of all the times she's nagged at him just to throw it in the fucking trash can. It's too dark to see exactly what she's doing, so she has to grope around a little to find Jim's cock. The condom rolls on with a cold, slick sound, and Jim gasps. She spreads her legs wider and presses him against her.
"Slow," he rasps, pushing inside, and Pam's not sure if he's telling her or himself.
"Come on," she begs, rocking against him. He starts to move, achingly slow and shallow, his fingers barely rubbing against her clit. "Oh, God, more--"
Another inch of him, maybe, slides into her. She can feel his shoulders and arms trembling with effort, but he still keeps moving at that exquisitely slow pace. Another inch, and another, and suddenly he's all the way inside her. Pam locks her heels around his thighs, pushes up hard, and comes, not bothering to keep quiet.
"Oh, God," he pants, and starts thrusting in earnest, his whole body trembling. "Oh, Jesus-- Pam--"
She pulls him closer, pressing her palms into the small of his back, and he tenses against her, groaning as he comes.
* * * *
"Okay, okay, I've got one," Pam mumbles sleepily into his neck. Jim shifts his weight, trying to get her cheekbone to press into a less uncomfortable spot. "Okay. So an elderly doctor and a Baptist minister are sitting next to each other on a plane that gets delayed on the runway for two or three hours--"
"Completely plausible," Jim says, rubbing his chin against her hair.
She slaps his chest gently and leaves her hand there. "Hush. So after they take off, the pilot gets on the intercom, apologizes, blah blah blah sorry for the delay you'll all be getting a free round of drinks."
"Awesome flight."
Pam gives him an adorable little warning growl. "So, okay, the stewardess comes around to serve their drinks, and the doctor gets a gin and tonic. The stewardess asks the minister if he wants anything, and he says, 'Oh, no, I would rather commit adultery than drink alcohol.' And the doctor immediately hands his drink back to the stewardess and says, 'Madam, I did not know there was a choice.'" She presses her face against him and snuffles giggles into his chest.
Jim rolls his eyes and runs a hand down her spine. "You are such a dork."
"Oh, wait, I should tell you the one about the panda and the prostitute." She yawns. "Or maybe it's a koala bear, I don't remember."
"Fantastic. Hold that thought; I have to go pee." He pushes at her shoulder and she rolls off of him, ending up face-down on the other side of the bed. "Don't suffocate," he suggests.
"M'kay."
He searches briefly for his boxers, but gives up on finding them in the dark and wanders off toward the bathroom naked, feeling weird, like he should hold his hands over his junk. Being in the bathroom is also weird, once his eyes adjust to the light. He's been in other people's bathrooms before, been naked in other girls' bathrooms before, but what he's seeing here is a lived-in bathroom, with toilet paper rolls still in the plastic packaging and a box of tampons sitting on the toilet tank. Well-worn toothbrushes lie next to an uncapped tube of toothpaste; there's a pair of boxer shorts behind the door; Pam's birth control pills are on the sink, right by what has to be Roy's razor. It's another unearned glimpse of her life; he gets to see what she's like when she's living with a guy, without being the guy she's living with. Jim feels lost and alien, like he's stuck in some wacky alternate dimension.
When he gets back to the bedroom, Pam is asleep on her belly with her right knee and right elbow out to the side and almost touching, like she fell asleep in the middle of an emphatic dance move. He just watches her for a moment, trying to get his bearings, listening to her soft breathing.
He's not supposed to be here. This isn't his place.
She stirs, lifts her head. "Hey."
"Hey." He climbs back into the bed, feeling strangely more like an invader now than when he was fucking Pam. She moves up against him and he wraps his arms around her, buries his face in her hair. "Mmm. Missed you."
She makes a curious noise. "Wha... how long was I asleep?"
Jim kisses her head softly. "Only a minute or two, I think. I just... I missed you." He can feel all his defenses slipping with that admission, leaving him wide open for whatever betrayal is coming next, but he can't bring himself to care.
"Oh," Pam says. He expects her to stiffen up, pull away, but she just snuggles against him tighter and sighs, a big relaxed sigh that feels like she's let all the air out of her lungs. He smooths a hand up and down her back, feeling her breathing even out and slow, and realizes after a minute that she's gone right back to sleep on him.
This feels too fragile to be real. He can't move for fear of breaking it. He just lies there, feeling her sleeping body warm against his skin, listening to her breath squeak a little where her nose is squashed into his chest.
"I wish I could keep you," he whispers, half-hoping that she'll wake up. She doesn't.
Series Authors: annakovsky, honey_wheeler, kyrafic, and obsession_inc
Chapter Title: Warning : Entanglement Hazard
Chapter Author: obsession_inc
Fandom: The Office (US)
Pairing: Jim/Pam
Rating: NC-17
Words: 12,000
Summary: Set during Dwight's Speech, Take Your Daughter To Work Day, and Michael's Birthday. This is in two parts, due to it taking place over three episodes and LJ not allowing entries over a certain length.
Notes: annakovsky, kyrafic, and honey_wheeler brainstormed, plotted, betaed, encouraged, ass-kicked, spoon-fed, and hand-held on this one, above and beyond the call of duty. I absolutely could not have done it without them.
Part I is here.
Part II
Some people bring over cassaroles in times of crisis; Pam draws. She thought about drawing Kevin as a rotund knight slaying a skin-cancer dragon, but she got stuck trying to figure out how to envision skin cancer as a dragon, so that went in the trash. Once, way back, Kevin had said that he thought snow globes were funny, so Pam draws a little picture for him of the Accounting department in a snow globe, using a fresh Sharpie. Angela and Kevin are easy to caricature-- all straight lines and angles for Angela, all circles and curves for Kevin-- but Oscar doesn't have any easily simplified features, so his Sharpie-sketch turns out looking like a short, irritable Barack Obama. She picks it up by the corners and holds it up for the camera, and Jim comes over to the reception desk so he can take a look.
It's his third trip up to her desk today, which means that they're almost back to their pre-unpleasantness average (not counting lunch or breaks or any incidental meetings). Not that she's counting. It's nice to have him back; it's nice to have her friend again. It's like-- she barely dares to think this, but still-- it's like they've resolved the sex thing that had been lurking under their friendship from the very beginning. Maybe this is it; maybe they've gotten it out of their systems, and everything's going to be better from here on out. It's more than the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel-- it's like the tunnel hadn't just been dark, but full of water, and Pam's been swimming without a breath for forever, and now she's suddenly broken through into an unexpected pocket of air that's saved her from drowning.
Jim leans over the counter to get a better look at the picture. "Needs snow," he says, chewing thoughtfully on one of Michael's birthday doughnuts.
She holds up the Sharpie and shrugs. "Got anything more snow-colored?"
Jim purses his lips in concentration, then nods and taps on the desktop counter. "Gimme," he orders, and when Pam obediently slides the picture over, he brushes the powdered sugar off his doughnut, letting it fall onto the picture. "There you go. Accountants Under Glass, Pamela Beesly, 2006. Sharpie Fine Point Marker and confectioner's sugar on recycled copier paper; 8 1/2 by 11 inches. Suitable for framing but not for human consumption." He loops a grin at her.
She bursts out laughing and takes the picture back, careful not to smear the sugar. "It's a lucky thing you didn't pick a jelly doughnut."
"Oh, Pam," he tuts. "Luck has nothing to do with it. This is art."
"This is breakfast," she counters, "and you got it all over my desk."
Jim looks down. "Oops." He brushes ineffectually at the white flecks of sugar. It gets stuck to his fingers, and he makes a motion like he's going to wipe it off on his pants, but stops just in time and makes a face. "Oh, well," he says, and before Pam has time to register what's happening, he has his hand up by his mouth and is licking the sugar off with small flicks of his tongue, like a fussy cat.
She stares, a sense memory washing through her of that tongue on her mouth, under her jaw, working his way down her stomach.
"What?" he asks, pausing with one finger right by his open mouth.
Pam shakes her head wordlessly, but the thoughts must be plain as day on her face because Jim's eyes darken and she can see his adam's apple bob as he swallows. Her heart is beating, beating, but she can't remember the last time she took a breath. "Um," she manages at last, "I've got napkins, if you want..."
"Sure," he says, his eyes not leaving hers. Their fingers brush when she hands him the napkin, which makes them both jump a little, like a spark of static electricity. It looks like he's about so say something else, but then Dwight comes marching up with a clipboard, snapping at her about the exact freezer temperature for maintaining the proper firmness of an ice cream cake, and Jim just gives her a look she can't quite translate and goes back to his desk.
She excuses herself to go to the bathroom and sits in one of the stalls for what feels like forever, reminding herself that this was just a memory. They'll have those, now; there's no way to have a sexual relationship with someone and not occasionally remember what it was like. This is normal.
She presses her flushed face against the cool tile wall and wonders if it's also normal to feel so much like she's lying to herself.
* * * *
Jim has his hand so far back on the Rite-Aid shelf that he can feel the edge digging into his armpit, and he's already trying to think of ways that sixty-eight packages of Cup o' Noodles would not be anticlimactic when his fingers finally brush against what must be the last one in the store. "Aha!" he exclaims, and hauls it out in triumph. "Sixty-nine."
"Oh, thank God." Pam lets out her breath in a whoosh, like she'd been holding it. "Are there any left in there, or do you think we've cleaned them out?"
Jim hunkers down so that the shelf is on eye-level. "I think that's it," he says. "Wow. Is that cutting it close, or what?"
"Must be fate," Pam agrees. She tucks her arms around herself and smiles, and he smiles back, and they just stand there for a minute smiling over a cart full of an absurd number of cup o' noodles.
"What else?" he asks, and starts pushing the cart again, leaning over to steer with his forearms, which coincidentally puts his head right around the same height as Pam's. The camera guy has wandered off, probably bored out of his mind by the cups o' noodles counting; maybe he's outside getting some establishing shots. It leaves them alone for a heady moment, free of any interference. "Cupcakes? Candy? Pornography?"
"Well, porn, obviously," Pam says, "but we'll have to get that somewhere else. In the meantime, I think... M&Ms. Lots of them."
He looks at her, and can't help smiling. "Oh, yeah, good point-- we need more than he can fit in his mouth at one time, so..."
"A party-pack it is, then." She stops suddenly. "Wait, weren't they in the last aisle?"
"No idea." Jim stands straight up and starts to turn the cart around. It moves ponderously, squeaking; one of the wheels feels like it isn't turning. He tugs on it and makes a tortured face.
"Just leave it there," Pam says.
"But--" Jim looks at the cart, blocking most of the narrow aisle, and that's when her small, cool hand slips into his and tugs gently.
"Come on," she tells him, grinning up at him with a warmth in her eyes that makes his breath catch. He lets her lead him away, her hand still tucked into his, tugging at him like he's a recalcitrant puppy. She keeps peeking back over her shoulder for long seconds with one side of her mouth still curled up in that lopsided grin, looking just plain happy, and it's been so long since he's seen her look like that, he'd do anything to keep that smile on her face. He doesn't understand what they're doing, or what she's thinking, or why he can't do a damn thing to resist her. He just knows that he'd follow her anywhere.
Pam's fingers start to loosen when they get near all the big bags of candy, but he hangs on, not ready to let go just yet. She looks up at him quickly, eyebrows raised in joking protest, and Jim squeezes her hand in a friendly manner. She squeezes back, swinging their entwined hands between them like they're warming up a jump-rope, and she's smiling, and he just can't help it-- he cups her hand in both of his, lifting it up and holding it just under his chin, bowing his head. He closes his eyes for a moment, breathing in the fresh melon scent of her hand lotion, before he presses his lips to her knuckles, once, very softly, and once again.
"Jim." Her voice is low, and it sounds like a warning. He opens his eyes and finds her staring right at him, a panicky, stricken expression on her face. "Don't," she says, but her voice falters on the word, and she blushes and looks down as she pulls her hand away.
This is the point where he knows he should apologize, should stop and back up. They've been on this road before, and it'll just end up going over a cliff again-- only this time, there won't be any chance of survival. If he just lets this go, if he keeps things simple, if he doesn't give in to this self-destructive impulse, then maybe he can move on and they can stay friends after June tenth. If not--
It's a choice. He can't pretend it's not. He won't be able to pretend, later, that he didn't know better, or couldn't stop himself. It's a choice.
There's a crash at the far end of the aisle, and they both jump; Pam lets out a little shriek. Two carts are nose-to-nose with each other, one manned by an angry old lady with a Bronx accent and a lot to say, and the other by an old guy barely taller than his cart who appears to still be pushing, stubbornly trying to shove the noisy lady from the Bronx out of his way. The camera guy walks into view, clearly focusing on the excitement.
Jim looks back at Pam, alarmed. "Did he--"
"No, I think we're okay." She holds his gaze for a moment, her eyes solemn and a little sad, but that soft warmth starts creeping in again. "Just-- later, all right?"
"Yeah," he agrees, and leans over to get the M&Ms. "Later."
* * * *
The last time Pam went skating was also at a birthday party, but in that case it'd been for her friend Lindsay Brauner, who'd been turning twelve. All Pam can really remember about it is scooting around the perimeter, clinging to the wall, while everyone else sailed past like they'd been born skating. Since that's not really a fond memory, it's really amazing that Jim could coax her out on the ice at all today. Which was-- well. Nice. Really nice.
The thing is, she'd forgotten how sore skating makes her ankles, so she really doesn't stay out on the ice all that long. She sits on one of the long benches at rinkside and fumbles off her gloves to unlace her skates, halfway watching in her peripheral vision as everyone glides around the rink in elliptical courses, like comets in mittens and scarves.
One of the comets lets its orbit decay, slowing to a stop by the wall just in front of her. She knows even before she looks up that it's Jim. "Hey," he says, pushing the door open. "What happened to the next Oksana Baiul?"
"Feet hurt," she explains. "They're not used to the whole skating thing." She gets the last loop of the lace unhooked and peels the long tongue down; when she gets her foot out of the ten-ton skate, it feels practically weightless by comparison. "Ohhhh, that's better," she sighs, and gets to work on the other one.
Jim clambers off the ice and sits next to her, balancing his feet on the back ends of his skate blades. "You were really getting the hang of the whole skating thing near the end, there."
She snorts. "Yeah, well. Yay for not falling on my butt!"
"No, I'm serious. You did good." He wags his skates from side to side in ponderous arcs and then lets them both flop inwards, the tips of the blades clashing together heavily. "I never thought I'd say this, but I've actually enjoyed Michael's birthday this year."
"Me too," Pam agrees. "I mean, well, since Kevin doesn't have cancer. Otherwise I would have had to downgrade my rating." She pries her other foot out of the skate with only three-quarters of the laces undone, unable to wait any longer, and heaves a sigh of relief. "I think my skates are a little too small."
"Nah, they all feel like that." Jim looks down, watches her toes wiggling inside her socks. "Anyway, I think Kelly said something about you guys going off to get some kind of fancy pedicures tomorrow, so I guess you'll have a chance to get any damage repaired."
Pam claps a hand to her forehead. "Oh, God, I forgot all about that."
"Really? I thought you would've been looking forward to it." He lifts his eyebrows solemnly. "Not every woman gets the chance to have a whole day-- a whole day, mind you-- in the company of Kelly Kapoor."
"Hey, it's still better than my original plans for the weekend."
"Which were...?"
"Watching the Changing Spaces marathon and tying bows on a couple hundred little bags of birdseed."
"Oh, I don't know," Jim says. "On the one hand, quality cable programming; on the other--"
"No, she's okay, I mean, it's just--" She stops and presses her cold feet together at the ankle, bites her lip; she starts twice, trying to work up to forming the words, and finally just blurts out, "Roy's out of town this weekend."
Jim goes very still. His eyes flick over to her and his mouth opens slightly like he's having trouble breathing. "Oh," he says, and leans forward, elbows on knees. He stares into space, nodding softly, taps his fingers together a few times, and says, "Oh," again, very quietly.
"Yeah, so..." Pam laughs weakly. She's kind of having trouble breathing, herself. "Um, he dropped me off at work this morning and took the truck, so. Kind of why I've been using you as my personal chauffeur all day."
There's a long moment of silence, punctuated by the slicing sounds of people skating by. Pam can hear Meredith guffawing and Kevin's droning voice, somewhere on the other side of the rink, far away. She breathes carefully, slow and shallow, trying to slow her heart and keep it from battering its way through her ribs.
Finally, Jim makes a soft sound, almost like a chuckle, and turns to look at her, a smile slowly curving his mouth. "I have to ask, Beesley," he asks, "is this your way of asking for a ride home?"
"What?" she exclaims. "N-- well, not exactly, but if you're offering--"
"Me? Oh, no." Jim waves a hand languidly. "But I'm sure Dwight would be more than happy to--"
"You are such a jerk," she laughs, and bumps her shoulder against him. When she puts her hand down, after, it ends up right next to his, barely touching.
They stay that way, not really looking at each other, until Michael comes to a dramatic hockey-league halt in front of them and hollers, "Come on, come on, it's time for presents! For Kevin!"
* * * *
The problem with having Pam in his car is that Jim is conditioned, now, to associate having her in his car with sex. Well, hand-jobs, blow-jobs, whatever; the point is that the lizard part of his brain has done the math and come up with Pam + car = orgasm, so giving Pam a ride home puts Jim in the position of trying to keep from getting an erection, every single moment, and still manage to drive. It's not easy, but he's trying his best, because even if this feels like it's going the way he thinks it's going, he's not sure if it's really going to go that way, and even if it does, he's not sure if he wants it to, and so frankly this is complicated enough without showing all his cards by getting a boner.
He's not getting any answers from Pam, that's for sure. She's been quiet the whole time, looking out the window, her hands locked together in her lap. Whatever's going on in her brain, it's not showing on her face.
For the sake of his own mental health, he runs through the options for dinner. Currently the groceries are at low ebb, since he usually does his shopping on the weekends, but he thinks he might have a box of mac 'n' cheese left, and possibly hot dogs. Hot dogs and mac 'n' cheese, together, are possibly the greatest culinary invention to come out of the twentieth century, so... not a bad plan, really.
"Left here," Pam says softly.
"Yeah, I know." He bites his tongue before he adds I've been here before, remember?, and turns left onto Pam's street. She doesn't prompt him about which house it is, so apparently the message got through without saying it out loud. He parks in front of the house and, against his better judgement, goes ahead and turns the car completely off. For a long, tense moment the only sound is the ticking noise of the motor cooling down.
"So," Pam says, staring down at her hands.
"So," he echoes.
She looks out the window, at the dark house. "Um... can I ask you a favor?"
"Sure," he says, trying to keep his tone light, trying to distract her from whatever is looming behind her eyes. "As long as it doesn't have anything to do with breaking into the Gotham Museum of Natural History to steal dinosaur bones for reanimation, because I promised Batman I wouldn't do that anymore."
Pam laughs a little. "Well, maybe I'll talk you into it next time."
"And make me go back on my word?" He sighs dramatically. "Oh, Pam. Will you never let me escape this life of crime?"
"It's terrible, I know," she says. "Seriously, though, could you come inside? Just for a minute?"
Jim's heart jumps. It's insanely difficult to avoid making assumptions about where this is going, but he's doing his best. "Need some help checking your coat closet for ax murderers?"
"Oh, yeah," she laughs, looking down at her lap. "You know how it is in Scranton these days; if it's not bears, it's pirates, if it's not pirates..."
"...It's ax murderers," he finishes, and smiles in spite of himself. "Yeah, okay. I don't think I'd be able to live with myself if I let you go in by yourself and you ended up getting ambushed by robot ninjas or something."
Pam opens her door and climbs out. "You're the last of the true gentlemen, Mr. Halpert," she says over her shoulder.
Jim can't help looking at the driveway as they walk to the door. He tells himself that it won't matter if Roy is actually home; all Jim's going to do is wave a baseball bat at a few shifty-looking closets, so if there's a pickup truck in that driveway he'll just get to go home to his gourmet meal of Kraft and Hormel products that much sooner. He looks at the driveway anyway. It's empty.
Pam stops after she's unlocked the door and looks up at him impishly; he lifts his fists, assumes his best battle-ready expression, and nods. She nods back and throws the door open. No robot ninjas are in evidence.
"Well," Pam says. "So far, so good." She reaches around the edge of the doorway, fishing for the light switch.
"Careful." Jim keeps his fists up, craning his neck to peer inside. "Those ax murderers can be tricky bastards."
"Bears," she corrects him, leading the way through the door. "Or pirates."
"Those, too," he agrees, and closes the door behind them.
Pam puts her coat and purse on the couch as she walks past it. "Hello?" she calls. "Any ax murderers, bears, pirates, or ninjas--"
"Robot ninjas."
"--or robot ninjas, this is your last chance! Come out, come out, wherever you are!"
They pause, and listen. Nothing.
"I think we're okay," Pam says, and turns around with a bright grin.
Oh, that smile. Jim feels a hollow ache settle into his chest just from looking at her. He swallows. "I don't know," he says at last. "I mean, it seems like we are, I just don't want to be wrong."
Her head tips a little to one side as she gives him a careful look. "We are," she assures him. "Everything turned out fine. Right?"
It's rapidly becoming apparent that they're not talking about imaginary intruders anymore, and it makes Jim's stomach twist sickly. They've never discussed things before, not ever, and he doesn't really want to start now, but they're kind of in the middle of it already so it's a little late to back out. "Right," he agrees. "And we're okay."
"Right." She nods a few times more than is necessary. "I like things being okay."
"Me, too."
"It's nice. It's nice, and it's fun, and it's... okay." Pam flicks a quick look at him, and says, very softly, "I don't want to have things not be okay again. You know?"
"I know." Jim feels his stomach twist again. Mac 'n' cheese, he reminds himself. Hot dogs. He has dinner to look forward to; this is not, not, not a letdown. "Better to just have things... stay okay."
"As long as it is okay," she says softly. "But what if it's not? What if what we think is okay now turns out not to be okay later? What if okay is--" She breaks off abruptly and presses her hands to her head. "Oh God, the more I say that word the less it sounds like it's even English."
He tries to laugh, but nothing comes out. He's still back at the what if. "If?" he manages. "What--?"
Pam makes a strange sound, frustrated and sad and sweet all at the same time, and gives him a look to match. "Jim," she says, her voice catching, "I--"
And then she's kissing him.
In a way, part of him has been waiting for this all day, sensing it in the air like a storm coming-- not so much knowing it would happen as knowing that the right conditions existed. Jim is still caught completely off-guard. He'd given up on ever being able to touch her again; every morning for weeks he's been waking up almost happy before he catches himself and remembers that this weird thing of theirs is over. He knows he shouldn't, he knows that he'll regret this sooner rather than later, but he feels like he does those first waking moments, before the reality check, and it's too much to give up.
He wraps his arms around her waist, pulling her whole body against his and off the ground a little-- she must be up on the tips of her toes-- and just kisses her, kisses her, kisses her. She's got her hands fisted in his hair and is pulling him closer, making these delicious little noises in the back of her throat, and he groans into her mouth in response.
Pam shifts her balance and her foot comes down right on his pinkie toe; he yelps. "Sorry," she murmurs against his jaw.
"Mm," he says, dismissing it, and works a hand down to cup her ass and pull her up higher. He can feel her mouth, pressed against his neck, twist into a smile, and she starts shaking slightly. It takes a second to work out that somehow, Pam's got the giggles. "Something funny?" he asks.
"Robot ninjas," she tells him, and laughs outright, a big open-mouthed delighted laugh that makes his heart flip over pleasantly. "I had no idea what a menace they were."
"Well," he admits, "the alternative was something like 'why, Miss Beesly, are you planning on taking advantage of me?' but I was afraid it might dissuade you."
"Probably," she agrees, and pulls his mouth down to hers again. Jim pushes her up against a wall, because experience has taught him that when making out with someone more than a whole head shorter than he is, the only two ways to avoid neck strain are to either lie down or involve a sturdy wall. Pam makes a sort of hrmph! noise and pulls back. "Hold on, now," she informs him, "the wall thing was not so great last time." She's smiling, though, and doesn't seem mad.
"Among other things," he agrees, kissing her neck. "Don't worry. Not the plan this time."
"There's a plan?" she asks breathlessly, and hooks one of her legs around his, the better to grind her hips against his. The erection he'd been fighting all night is back with a vengeance, and his new problem is trying to avoid coming in his pants like he was fourteen all over again.
He's grasping desperately for a bare minimum of coherence, and the way she's moving against him is not making that easy. "Kind of a plan," he gasps. "More like a concept. Thinking of seeing if we're any good at this if we go slow."
"Guess we'll find out," Pam moans, almost directly into his ear, from where she's nipping at his jaw. "We've got time."
The thought flashes through his mind that they're alone, that Roy isn't coming back tonight, that they have all night-- and oh, God, he almost loses his fucking mind thinking about it. Hours of touching, no rush, no interruptions, just her, with him. All night.
"New plan," he says, and lets her slide down to a standing position again. "Less wall, more b-- more lying down." He hopes that he made it over that little fumble without Pam catching it, but she stiffens in his arms and he knows she caught the half-spoken bed. For anyone else in the midst of foreplay, a normal word: for a guy standing in the house where his occasional lover lives with her fiancé, not so much. Shit.
When Jim looks at her, Pam is chewing on her lower lip, staring fixedly at his chin. He steps back a little, so he's not so much holding her as gently grasping her elbows, and watches as a stormy, impenetrable thought process rages across her face. Finally she looks down and slides one of her hands down his arm until she's holding his hand.
Silently, she leads him into the unfamiliar territory of the hallway. They pass a bathroom with sea-green tile, a door that appears to be a linen closet, and then they're in the bedroom. Pam flips on the light, drops his hand, and gives him a look like she's challenging him to say something.
The place is a mess. Not just the stuff jumbled around on the dresser, the unmade bed, and the pile of clothes near the laundry hamper-- that, he's used to, that's normal life as far as he's concerned. The part that really strikes him is the quiet hand of design peeking out from underneath the debris: the selection of the furniture (Target cheap, but all matching, with nice lines), the soft colors of the sheets and the quilt, the framed watercolors, the way the walls have been painted not just with the sky-blue base color, but with a layer of misty white fading in mid-way to the ceiling, slowly eclipsing the blue. So much care has been taken with the creation of this room that the careless way it's being treated seems not just callous, but mean.
Jim reaches out and touches the frame of one of the watercolors. "I like it. Yours?" he asks.
She nods, still silent, watching him like she's waiting for something specific. He looks at her, trying to puzzle out what she's after, but the shutters are down and it's tough to read her. Is she waiting for him to admit what a big step this is? Does she expect him to say something stupid about Roy? Does she want him to reassure her that he's not expecting anything to change with the wedding and all?
He takes a deep breath and plunges in. "So, Mickey Mouse is in the middle of a nasty divorce with Minnie Mouse," he says. "Mickey's arguing with the judge, and the judge says, 'Look, I'm sorry, Mickey, but you can't just divorce Minnie because you think she's a little crazy.' And Mickey says, 'Your Honor, I never said she was a little crazy, I said she was fucking Goofy!"
Pam just stares at him like he's insane, and she shakes her head back and forth three or four times before the corners of her mouth turn up and she's laughing helplessly. "Okay... um-- is one of us supposed to be Goofy in this scenario?"
"Yes," Jim says solemnly. "Me."
"I can totally see that," she laughs, and goes up on tip-toe to give him a single soft kiss. "C'mere, Goofy," she orders, and starts unbuttoning his shirt.
* * * *
If Pam thinks about this too hard, the guilt is going to crush her. She'd kissed Roy good-morning in this room, on this bed, less than twelve hours ago. He had cupped a hand around the back of her head and breathed his morning breath on her face when their lips parted, and then he'd grinned and tweaked her breast gently. She's trying not to think of that right now, with Jim in their bed, because the two scenes start to overlap in her head and she finds herself comparing them, putting the two men in the same role and... and...
It's one thing to compare Roy and Jim before, when one meant a future and the other meant a quick fuck here and there, but this is different. Dangerous. She's not sure if she's ever going to be able to draw sharp lines around their roles again, and, worse, she's not sure if she wants to. She wants Jim in her bed, with all that entails, even if-- God help her-- that means that he's taking Roy's place.
It's hilarious that for all the sex and all the emotional drama, she's only seen Jim naked twice before, both times under harsh lighting conditions. She's never seen him naked with the lights off, hovering over her like this, barely visible, outlined in soft charcoal shades and highlighted with faint yellow tones from the streetlight down the block.
"Touch me," she tells him. Obediently, he runs a hand down her side, over her hip, back up and over her stomach. It tickles, and she rolls sideways, swatting his hand away. "Hey, that's not what I meant."
"You didn't specify," Jim says, kissing a slow path down the slope of one breast.
"You knew what I meant." She doesn't say, You always know.
He teases her nipple with his tongue, brushing his hand down her side again. "I figured that the rule was, if you didn't specify, I got to choose."
Pam reaches for his hand and presses it against her thigh. "Please."
"In due time," he promises, and kisses his way across to her other nipple. His hand stays on her thigh, excruciatingly close to where she wants it, his fingers moving in languid patterns and making stray sparks shoot up her spine. Once, the back of his hand brushes against her and her hips buck involuntarily.
"Please," she says, more forcefully.
"Here?" he asks in a too-knowing voice, and traces a single finger lightly over her, just barely stirring the hair.
She presses her head back into the pillow. "Oh, God, you tease."
"Shh." His hand moves up again, more pressure this time, but still nowhere near what she needs. He dips a finger into her, slow and shallow. "We've got time," he whispers, and moves that finger lightly around her clit.
"You're going to kill me," Pam grumbles, and moves her hand down his stomach, feeling blindly for his cock, determined to make him get on with the program.
"Hey, now." Jim moves his hips away from her. He kisses her neck, down low by her collarbone, tickling her nose with his hair; she purses her lips and blows the hair away, trying not to sneeze. "Patience, young padawan."
"Don't get dorky on me," she says. "I'm not-- oh--" She cuts herself off with a gasp as Jim slides his finger inside her a little further and brushes her clit with his thumb at the same time.
"Like I said," he murmurs, biting lightly at her shoulder, "I want to see if we're good at this when we take it slow." Two fingers now, gliding in and out with insanely slow strokes, pausing at the top of each stroke to circle her clit.
"We're good, we're good," she babbles, pulling at his shoulders, digging her heels into the bed and pushing up. "Please, Jim, come on--"
His fingers slip deep into her and he groans, pressing his face into her neck. "Oh, God, you're so-- oh, Pam--"
"Please."
Jim shifts his weight, moving over her, the bed squeaking a too-familiar tune. "Shit, where's the--"
She leans over, half-trapped by the way her legs are tangled with his, and fumbles at the nightstand for a condom. "I got it." She's careful to toss the wrapper back behind the bed, where Roy always does in spite of all the times she's nagged at him just to throw it in the fucking trash can. It's too dark to see exactly what she's doing, so she has to grope around a little to find Jim's cock. The condom rolls on with a cold, slick sound, and Jim gasps. She spreads her legs wider and presses him against her.
"Slow," he rasps, pushing inside, and Pam's not sure if he's telling her or himself.
"Come on," she begs, rocking against him. He starts to move, achingly slow and shallow, his fingers barely rubbing against her clit. "Oh, God, more--"
Another inch of him, maybe, slides into her. She can feel his shoulders and arms trembling with effort, but he still keeps moving at that exquisitely slow pace. Another inch, and another, and suddenly he's all the way inside her. Pam locks her heels around his thighs, pushes up hard, and comes, not bothering to keep quiet.
"Oh, God," he pants, and starts thrusting in earnest, his whole body trembling. "Oh, Jesus-- Pam--"
She pulls him closer, pressing her palms into the small of his back, and he tenses against her, groaning as he comes.
* * * *
"Okay, okay, I've got one," Pam mumbles sleepily into his neck. Jim shifts his weight, trying to get her cheekbone to press into a less uncomfortable spot. "Okay. So an elderly doctor and a Baptist minister are sitting next to each other on a plane that gets delayed on the runway for two or three hours--"
"Completely plausible," Jim says, rubbing his chin against her hair.
She slaps his chest gently and leaves her hand there. "Hush. So after they take off, the pilot gets on the intercom, apologizes, blah blah blah sorry for the delay you'll all be getting a free round of drinks."
"Awesome flight."
Pam gives him an adorable little warning growl. "So, okay, the stewardess comes around to serve their drinks, and the doctor gets a gin and tonic. The stewardess asks the minister if he wants anything, and he says, 'Oh, no, I would rather commit adultery than drink alcohol.' And the doctor immediately hands his drink back to the stewardess and says, 'Madam, I did not know there was a choice.'" She presses her face against him and snuffles giggles into his chest.
Jim rolls his eyes and runs a hand down her spine. "You are such a dork."
"Oh, wait, I should tell you the one about the panda and the prostitute." She yawns. "Or maybe it's a koala bear, I don't remember."
"Fantastic. Hold that thought; I have to go pee." He pushes at her shoulder and she rolls off of him, ending up face-down on the other side of the bed. "Don't suffocate," he suggests.
"M'kay."
He searches briefly for his boxers, but gives up on finding them in the dark and wanders off toward the bathroom naked, feeling weird, like he should hold his hands over his junk. Being in the bathroom is also weird, once his eyes adjust to the light. He's been in other people's bathrooms before, been naked in other girls' bathrooms before, but what he's seeing here is a lived-in bathroom, with toilet paper rolls still in the plastic packaging and a box of tampons sitting on the toilet tank. Well-worn toothbrushes lie next to an uncapped tube of toothpaste; there's a pair of boxer shorts behind the door; Pam's birth control pills are on the sink, right by what has to be Roy's razor. It's another unearned glimpse of her life; he gets to see what she's like when she's living with a guy, without being the guy she's living with. Jim feels lost and alien, like he's stuck in some wacky alternate dimension.
When he gets back to the bedroom, Pam is asleep on her belly with her right knee and right elbow out to the side and almost touching, like she fell asleep in the middle of an emphatic dance move. He just watches her for a moment, trying to get his bearings, listening to her soft breathing.
He's not supposed to be here. This isn't his place.
She stirs, lifts her head. "Hey."
"Hey." He climbs back into the bed, feeling strangely more like an invader now than when he was fucking Pam. She moves up against him and he wraps his arms around her, buries his face in her hair. "Mmm. Missed you."
She makes a curious noise. "Wha... how long was I asleep?"
Jim kisses her head softly. "Only a minute or two, I think. I just... I missed you." He can feel all his defenses slipping with that admission, leaving him wide open for whatever betrayal is coming next, but he can't bring himself to care.
"Oh," Pam says. He expects her to stiffen up, pull away, but she just snuggles against him tighter and sighs, a big relaxed sigh that feels like she's let all the air out of her lungs. He smooths a hand up and down her back, feeling her breathing even out and slow, and realizes after a minute that she's gone right back to sleep on him.
This feels too fragile to be real. He can't move for fear of breaking it. He just lies there, feeling her sleeping body warm against his skin, listening to her breath squeak a little where her nose is squashed into his chest.
"I wish I could keep you," he whispers, half-hoping that she'll wake up. She doesn't.