(026) just like heaven
Title; just like heaven
Fandom; The Office
Pairing; Pam/Karen
Rating; NC-17
Word count; ~4000
Short summary; Karen and Pam, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G. The domestic life of our two favorite Dunder-Mifflin women. Warning: sugary sweetness may cause cavities.
Warnings; Cursing, sexual content.
Disclaimer; I don't own The Office or any related media.
Notes; This fic is a disgustingly belated birthday present for my dear friend aphrodite-mine, who requested Pam/Karen domestic fic with weddings and babies. I hope you like it, Marcia, darling! ♥
1. It’s a Tuesday when Karen asks her out. Years later, Pam won’t remember the exact words that passed between her trembling lips; she’ll only recall bits and pieces, like the crème-colored barrette smoothly pulling Karen’s hair back from her face and the light flush of her cheeks in the crisp February air. But that’ll be enough.
2. They haven’t been out to dinner in almost two weeks. Karen’s been busy wrapping up her Master’s program at UPenn; Pam, on the other hand, has been applying for illustrating jobs left and right (mostly in advertising), all the while trying to keep up with work at Dunder-Mifflin and hide both her and Karen’s relationship and her impending job search from Michael. Needless to say, they’re both incredibly stressed out, so when Karen proposes a dinner date on Saturday night, Pam wholeheartedly agrees.
She’s surprised when, as the week rolls by, Karen seems to get more stressed, not less. Normally a neat person, she’s been forgetting to close doors, leaving half-empty mugs on the coffee table, and draping used towels on chairs; while they don’t officially live together yet, Pam spends more days at Karen’s apartment then her own, and she often ends up picking up after the other woman. She doesn’t mind, per se, but it’s a bit perplexing, seeing as Karen is usually the one who has to remind her not to toe her shoes off in the front hallway.
It isn’t until about halfway through the week that it hits her - maybe Karen’s worried about more than just school. Maybe - oh, Jesus - maybe Karen’s not happy with the way things are going. Maybe Pam left her toothbrush sitting in the sink one too many times. Maybe Karen’s going to - the thought makes her sick.
It had been strange at first, realizing how invested she is in this relationship. How Karen is so much more than just a casual fling. The way her face warms when Karen looks at her. How Karen is everything.
-
By the time Saturday evening rolls around, they’re both more stressed than they were when the week began - Karen for reasons unknown and Pam, in turn, because of Karen. They order in silence. Pam’s fingers drift to her earlobe to play with her pearl earrings - a six-month anniversary gift. She gulps at the thought. God, I hope this isn’t going where I think it’s going.
Karen clears her throat and drums her fingers lightly on the table.
“So, uh, Pam? There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”
God, no. Please don’t let this be happening. Not again. Pam looks down at her hands, at the fading paint on her fingernails. She’s trembling.
“I never thought…when I came to Scranton…I thought I was coming for Jim. I was coming for Jim.” Karen laughs awkwardly. “I didn’t expect to…to find what I found here.” Pam steels herself, slowly lets her gaze trail up Karen’s body to her face. She looks gorgeous; tiny diamonds twinkle in her earlobes and her eye makeup is subtly smoky. She’s dressed up more than she usually bothers for dates, Pam realizes.
“I didn’t expect to find you,” Karen exhales softly. She clears her throat and looks Pam straight in the eyes. “I didn’t expect to find this…to find what we have. Honestly, I’m not even sure that I found it…it feels more like it found me.” Pam has to suppress a smile at that; she knows the feeling all too well.
“Basically, what I’m trying to say is…Pam, I love you. You know that. And…”
It all clicks in Pam’s head a moment before Karen unclasps her hand and she sees the small velvet box. Oh, my God. Her hand flies to her mouth as she gasps.
“Will you…God, this is so cheesy; I never thought I’d be the one…” Karen looks at her plate for a moment, then back up. A single tear slides down Pam’s face.
“Damnit, I’d better do this properly, huh?” Karen puts her hand out to steady herself and pulls herself out of her chair; she doesn’t seem to have the strength to get up without using the table for support (or maybe she’s just trembling too much). She fumbles with her skirt for a moment, flattens it about her knees, and then gingerly kneels on the ground. She opens her mouth and Pam sees everything in Karen’s eyes, in her tongue, in her teeth, in the dip of her collarbone and the satiny silk of her dress falling across her hips and the ridges of her ankles.
“Will you marry me, Pam?”
Pam’s arms are around her neck before Karen has the time to blink. She feels Pam’s hot tears trickling down her shoulder and into the crook of her elbow.
“Uh, not to interrupt or anything, but you haven’t answered yet-” Pam laughs breathily and wipes her eyes with the back of her hand.
“How are we going to explain this to Michael?”
Karen’s grin could light up the night sky.
(This…this will work, Pam realizes. This will work.)
3. The church is old. The walls are scratched, evidence of the countless number of paintings and crucifixes that have been hung and adjusted and taken down, and the backs of the pews are peeling from two hundred years’ worth of children scuffing their feet along the wood.
Karen’s nails are painted a light pink. They match the flower tucked behind her ear and the light blush dusting her cheeks (the former resemblance is intentional; the latter is not). The neckline of her dress falls just low enough to hint at the smattering of freckles across her chest.
It’s funny, Pam thinks, all of the women who plan their weddings down to the last detail and break down crying when the caterer puts periwinkle icing on their cake instead of light blue. She and Karen had laughed about these women one night when poring over some bridal magazines on their coffee table; they’d been reading some article about How Not to be a Bridezilla.
“I swear to God, Pam,” Karen had said after reading one particular awful story about a woman from New York named Mary-Ann who ended up putting her husband in the hospital with severe bruising and a broken toe after he made fun of her color palette choices. “If you go all abusive on me because I insist on roses instead of violets, I am calling this wedding off faster than you can say ‘Andy Bernard is a tool’.”
Pam snorted.
“Of course,” Pam said mildly a few minutes later, “the cake will say ‘Congratulations to Pam and Karen’, right? No ‘Karen and Pam’ B.S.”
Karen had blinked, then laughed, tucking a few loose strands of hair back into her messy bun.
“In yo’ dreams, Beesley,” she’d said with a grin.
Now, Pam thinks that she wouldn’t care if their cake was decorated with alfafa sprouts and Karen had walked down the aisle in a clown suit. Hell, even Roy and Jim showing up to crash the wedding wouldn’t deter her now. It’s just her, Karen, a few layers of white silk, and the rings glinting on their fingers-these are the only things in the world, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
She hears the pastor say something about pronouncing them wife and wife, but her heart is pounding so hard in her ears she can’t make out the words. And then it doesn’t matter because Karen is kissing her, hard, right on the mouth, tongue and all-in front of their parents, oh God, and Michael, who insisted on getting an invite and is now whooping appreciatively in the front row next to a dumbfounded Jim and a leering Ryan.
(“We’re married,” Karen says to her that night, when there’s nothing between them at all, when it’s just skin and sweat and curves pressing together.
“I know,” Pam replies. Her jaw aches from smiling so hard.
“I know.”)
4. It’s one of those mornings where your eyelids are thick and your head feels full of cotton and everything comes a little slowly. Pam wrinkles her nose and blearily flings her arm over Karen’s side, leaning in to snuggle into her warmth and - Karen isn’t in bed. Pam blinks and rolls over.
Her own untamed early morning curls frame her vision of the dark-haired silhouette against the window, wearing a sports bra and some old plaid pajama pants, tracing patterns in the frost on the glass with her pinky.
She grumbles but climbs out of bed all the same; Karen's skin warms her better than the bedsheets anyhow. Pam leans over to plant a kiss on her lips, but Karen turns her head to the side so Pam hits her cheek instead.
“Morning breath,” Karen grins softly. Pam glares at her. Five minutes and some toothpaste later, she’s back with two mugs of cocoa and a ratty old blanket from the couch. This time Karen pulls her down, pressing her lips to Pam’s with a hint of insistence. Pam moans slightly and tangles her hand into Karen’s hair, but Karen lightly swats it and pulls away from the kiss.
“I’m busy,” she murmurs, pointing to the window. “Join me?”
“I could never deny you anything,” Pam replies with a playful grin. Karen gives her hips a little wiggle.
“Damn straight. Now c’mere, you.” She pats her pajama-clad lap. Pam settles herself down onto it, grinding her ass slightly against Karen’s thighs.
“Uhnn,” she sighs. “Later, okay?” She can see the pout on Pam’s face reflected frostily back at her in the window and it makes her giggle. Pam allows her face to relax into a smile, lightly bringing her foot around to stroke Karen’s ankle softly. She lifts her fingertips to the windowpane and drags them through the frost, joining the intricate little patterns Karen’s already created in the mist.
-
By the end of the morning, their windowsill is a frosted paradise of city streets, bursting with peeling old signs and hipster kids and Indian restaurants, framed by a skyline of mountains and airplanes, silhouetted against a setting sun. There are two figures standing on the sidewalk, hands interwoven; they’re almost indistinguishable, but a closer look reveals the trademark curly hair of one Pam Beesly, which means the other one has to be Karen.
Pam surveys their frosty artwork, then quirks her eyebrow.
“That isn’t Scranton,” Pam says. A moment of inspection by Karen, and then she nods.
“Nope. It sure isn’t.”
Pam climbs off of Karen’s lap and slides down onto the floor, resting her head on Karen’s knees.
“Where is it, do you think?” Karen lightly brushes Pam’s hair off of her face.
“Wherever we want it to be, I guess,” she says slowly. Pam smiles and leans in, kisses Karen’s belly button, slides her hands up to Karen’s sports bra and tugs at it insistently. Karen grins and pulls it over her head. Her nipples immediately perk as the cold air filtering in through the window hits them head on. Pam bends down and takes one into her mouth, warming it with her tongue.
“I was thinking…Seattle?” Karen says, her eyes glazing over slightly. Pam releases her nipple with a soft pop and moves over to lavish her attention on Karen’s other breast. Karen lazily tangles her fingers in Pam’s hair, making a soft mewling noise as Pam’s hand comes up to tweak at the nipple her mouth isn’t suckling. It’s not hurried; they have all morning - all afternoon if they really want it, even - they have all the time in the world, as cliché as it sounds, and Pam intends to use it; she intends to keep Karen right here until their mystery city has long faded from the windows.
Soon they’ve moved to the bed; Pam’s sliding down Karen’s body lithely, pushing her hands between Karen’s now naked thighs and parting them to give herself access. Karen’s wet, open, ready. The sight of her swollen folds sends a familiar warmth to pool in Pam’s belly and there’s a wetness growing between her own legs now, but that’s not important. This is.
She bends over and lightly drags her tongue up Karen’s slit, then down again, tasting the wetness on her tongue, tasting Karen. Karen’s hand tangles in the comforter and she moans softly; she’s not a loud person during sex, so Pam takes it as a good sign and nips ever so gently at Karen’s clit.
“Oh, Pam,” she gasps, clawing at the covers. “Pam.” Pam looks up lazily, eyes dark, pupils dilated.
“What were you saying about Seattle, Karen?” Pam says dreamily; one finger dips down, coats itself in Karen’s wetness, and slides into her before she can respond.
Karen makes an incoherent noise and grinds herself against Pam’s finger. Her walls are slick, warm; Pam quickly adds a second finger, then stills them both.
“I said, what were you saying about Seattle? I really am…curious to know,” she says. Karen grunts and swirls her hips, but Pam doesn’t budge.
“I was saying that maybe…that maybe that’s our city - uhn,” she gasps. Pam’s thrusting her fingers now and sucking lightly on Karen’s clit as she does so; Karen’s surprised she’s so close, she usually takes longer to come, but sure enough, she’s clenching around Pam’s fingers and her walls are spasming and she’s moaning and thrashing and she’s there, oh, Jesus Christ.
When she finally forces her eyes open she sees Pam still kneeling between her legs, a sly, satisfied grin on her face. She slides her fingers out, reveling in the slick sound they make as she brings them to her mouth and begins to suck, her tongue swirling sensuously.
“Seattle it is, then,” she says triumphantly.
They move into their first apartment in Fremont three weeks later.
5. In the end, they decide that Pam will be the one to get pregnant but they’ll use Karen’s egg. “That way, we’ll both be a part of the baby,” Karen smiles, and it’s one of those beautiful romantic moments that bring tears to Pam’s eyes and a smile to her face and a heavy thrumming to her heart.
Everyone warns them that artificial insemination isn’t easy. It can take hundreds of times to get it right, Karen’s mother says. You have to make sure the sperm is healthy, Pam’s mom reminds them. Oh my God, will you be, like, putting some random guy’s jizz in you?! Kelly yells over the phone.
“Why can’t I just impregnate you myself?” Karen mutters after another bit of well-meaning but nonetheless annoying advice, this time from her brother’s wife. She’s lying on the couch with her head in Pam’s lap and her feet up on the armchair. Pam chuckles.
“I don’t know. I mean, everyone else I know can just grow a pair of testicles on command; why can’t you?” Karen shoots her a look and Pam leans forward to press a kiss to the top of her forehead, then resumes running her hand through Karen’s hair. The look on Karen’s face remains troubled, however; her forehead is creased and she’s biting her lip hesitantly. Pam inhales, then taps Karen lightly on the nose to get her attention.
“Hey, Karen,” she murmurs. “Look at me.” Karen grunts but obligingly pushes herself to a semi-seated position. “No, no, no, look at me,” Pam says, tilting Karen’s chin up and locking their eyes together. Karen’s face softens almost immediately.
“This is going to work. I am going to get pregnant and then I’m going to throw up and beg you to go get me pickles at three in the morning and make you massage my swollen ankles and complain about how much my boobs hurt and by the time nine months rolls around we’ll both be begging the kid to come out already and then it’s going to come out, perfectly healthy, with a great big set of lungs that’ll keep us up all night and a constantly dirty diaper and we’ll say, ‘Why the hell did we want a kid, anyway?’ but we’ll look it in the eyes and it’ll be so beautiful and it’ll be ours. Ours, Karen.” Pam takes a deep breath. “Okay, sweetie?” She never uses terms of endearment - neither of them do, really - but it feels right here, somehow.
“Okay, baby,” Karen breathes. “Okay.”
(Five days later, when they’re leaning over the third positive pregnancy test in as many hours, Pam can’t resist telling Karen I told you so.)
6. “I can’t see anything,” Karen whines.
“That’s the point of the blindfold,” chuckles Pam. “You’re almost there.” Her hand rests on Karen’s waist, leading her gently.
“Why am I letting a seven-month pregnant woman guide me, blindfolded, through my apartment building? I mean, no offense, but that belly of yours has taken away a bit of your coordination.” Karen grins; she can’t see, but she knows Pam is sticking her tongue out at the back of Karen’s head.
“You’re right. You can find your own way.” Pam abruptly removes her hand. Karen wobbles on her feet.
“Hey, hey! Not fair.” Pam giggles.
“I love your pouty face. But I’m kidding; you can take the blindfold off, now,” she says.
“Yay!” Karen’s hands reach up and tug the blindfold impatiently off of her face, which immediately softens as her eyes adjust to the candlelight. Their tiny kitchen table is totally decked out, complete with lacy tablecloth, matching lacy napkins, and two wine glasses (one full of Merlot, one full of Diet Coke). Pam’s made Karen’s favorite - a huge Italian dinner.
“Oh, Pam,” she sighs. “You really didn’t have to do this.”
“Bullcrap.” Pam waves her hand in the air. “It’s your birthday. Of course I did.”
“You must have worked on this all day when I was at work!” Karen exclaims. “Look at this! Oh, Pam.”
Pam grins softly up at her.
“You like it?”
Karen snorts and shakes her head, then envelops Pam in a giant hug, reaching around her big belly to rub her back.
“Of course I do, you goof. But you must be exhausted! Standing up all day in the kitchen. Weren’t you just saying that your feet were bugging you?”
“Pshaw,” Pam responds. “They’re just swollen. I’m pregnant, Karen. It kind of comes with the territory.”
Karen’s looking at her strangely now, and Pam’s eyebrow asks her a silent question as it raises.
“I just…you’re pregnant, aren’t you?”
Pam steps back and takes a look at Karen. Her nose is red. Little tears are starting to make their way down her face.
“Hey! Hey, hey, hey. What’s going on?”
“No, nothing. Nothing! Just…hearing you say it. It was…” Karen grins through her tears. “It sounds really, really nice.”
Pam’s heart thumps in her chest. Her pinky gently wraps itself around Karen’s.
“It does. I’m sure Baby likes the sound of it, too,” she says softly, tugging on Karen’s hand and guiding her to the table. Karen sits down and then looks up at her, eyes wide with wonder. She grabs Pam’s chin and pulls her down, insistently pressing their lips together as she reaches forward to rest her hand lightly on Pam’s belly.
“Yeah. Baby likes it,” Karen says softly. “Our Baby.”
7. Midway though her second set of pushes, Pam realizes that having a baby is not at all like the moves make it seem.
Karen’s clutching her hand so hard it hurts, looking tired and strained and almost frantic with worry; she only has an earring in one of her lobes, having forgotten to grab the other loop on the way out the door.
Pam’s hair hangs over her eyes in limp strands, furthermore obscuring her vision (already blurred by the tears of exertion clouding her eyes). Her chest feels tight, constricted somehow, and the feeling only increases with every push. Right now, Karen’s hand feels like the only thing keeping her moored in reality; she’s terrified that if she lets go, she’ll float off into a hazy world of pushing and crying and never come back.
(She nearly breaks one of Karen’s fingers, but Karen never tells her. Pam doesn’t ask about the splint Karen wears on her pinky for the next two weeks.)
“The baby’s never going to come out, Karen,” Pam moans. “It’s never, ever, ever, ever going to come out. It’s just going to get stuck in here and never going to-”
“Pam,” Karen murmurs, trying to keep her voice soft, calm, but failing miserably; it’s laced with tension and nervousness. “Pam. Just…remember why we did this. Okay? We did this because we wanted a baby. We wanted to have someone else in our life. We wanted to give someone else love; we wanted to make the world a better place for a little you. Or a little me. So I know this is hard for you, and believe me, it’s hard for me, too, but I just need you to push, just a little more, okay? It’s all going to be fine. I just-need you-to-”
“Karen, shut up or you are changing diapers for a year,” Pam hisses.
“O-kay!” Karen exclaims. “Shutting up.”
The doctor casts her a sympathetic glance; Karen shrugs. She wants to tell the doctor Pam’s always been a feisty one, but somehow she doesn’t think Pam will appreciate that at the moment. So instead she clams up, just gripping Pam’s hand (well, really she’s just letting Pam grip her hand and clenching her teeth from the pain) and biting her lip and hoping, wishing, even praying-which she stopped doing years ago-that this will be okay.
(It is, of course, more than six hours later, when Claire Beesley-Fillipelli comes into the world at eight pounds, seven ounces, bright pink and screaming her little lungs out. Pam wipes the hair out of her eyes, still gasping, looking more exhausted than Karen’s ever seen anyone look, but she’s smiling. It’s kind of incredible, actually, that smile, and the way it brightens up the whole room, and really, Pam, as if Karen needed another reason to remember why she married you right now, when you’ve already just given birth to her baby, but there it is. Pam Beesley’s megawatt smile, otherwise known as the reason for Karen Fillipelli’s existence on this earth.
Well, one of the reasons. The other one being the little bundle of screaming, chubby joy the doctor is currently placing softly into Pam’s open arms.
Karen grins and bends down to kiss first her daughter, then her wife, on the forehead.)
8. The sun doesn’t always shine through their window. Instead, Pam is getting used to the soft, insistent pounding of raindrops on the roof; she doesn’t admit it, but she finds it almost comforting. And while they get less snow than one might expect in Seattle, there have been a handful of mornings where they have to tread carefully through the powder on their lawn out to get the mail.
Claire cries often, which they both know is normal for a five-month old, but that doesn’t stop Karen from worrying herself sick. Surprisingly, she’s proven herself to be the overprotective parent; Pam would be happy just letting Claire lie around gurgling on the couch all day, but Karen insists on playing Mozart CDs while she sleeps, putting a baby monitor in every room in the house-Pam finds it exhausting, sometimes, to keep up with her, but she knows it’s all out of love for their baby, and for Pam, and for this little life they’ve made. So at the end of the day, she doesn’t mind all the hectic phone calls Karen makes to the doctors’ office at three a.m. wondering what the little rash is on Claire’s rear end. (Much.)
Even with Mount Saint Helens obstructing her view, her horizon -their horizon - still looks bigger than ever before.
And that, even on their worst days, has Pam smiling.
Fandom; The Office
Pairing; Pam/Karen
Rating; NC-17
Word count; ~4000
Short summary; Karen and Pam, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G. The domestic life of our two favorite Dunder-Mifflin women. Warning: sugary sweetness may cause cavities.
Warnings; Cursing, sexual content.
Disclaimer; I don't own The Office or any related media.
Notes; This fic is a disgustingly belated birthday present for my dear friend aphrodite-mine, who requested Pam/Karen domestic fic with weddings and babies. I hope you like it, Marcia, darling! ♥
1. It’s a Tuesday when Karen asks her out. Years later, Pam won’t remember the exact words that passed between her trembling lips; she’ll only recall bits and pieces, like the crème-colored barrette smoothly pulling Karen’s hair back from her face and the light flush of her cheeks in the crisp February air. But that’ll be enough.
2. They haven’t been out to dinner in almost two weeks. Karen’s been busy wrapping up her Master’s program at UPenn; Pam, on the other hand, has been applying for illustrating jobs left and right (mostly in advertising), all the while trying to keep up with work at Dunder-Mifflin and hide both her and Karen’s relationship and her impending job search from Michael. Needless to say, they’re both incredibly stressed out, so when Karen proposes a dinner date on Saturday night, Pam wholeheartedly agrees.
She’s surprised when, as the week rolls by, Karen seems to get more stressed, not less. Normally a neat person, she’s been forgetting to close doors, leaving half-empty mugs on the coffee table, and draping used towels on chairs; while they don’t officially live together yet, Pam spends more days at Karen’s apartment then her own, and she often ends up picking up after the other woman. She doesn’t mind, per se, but it’s a bit perplexing, seeing as Karen is usually the one who has to remind her not to toe her shoes off in the front hallway.
It isn’t until about halfway through the week that it hits her - maybe Karen’s worried about more than just school. Maybe - oh, Jesus - maybe Karen’s not happy with the way things are going. Maybe Pam left her toothbrush sitting in the sink one too many times. Maybe Karen’s going to - the thought makes her sick.
It had been strange at first, realizing how invested she is in this relationship. How Karen is so much more than just a casual fling. The way her face warms when Karen looks at her. How Karen is everything.
-
By the time Saturday evening rolls around, they’re both more stressed than they were when the week began - Karen for reasons unknown and Pam, in turn, because of Karen. They order in silence. Pam’s fingers drift to her earlobe to play with her pearl earrings - a six-month anniversary gift. She gulps at the thought. God, I hope this isn’t going where I think it’s going.
Karen clears her throat and drums her fingers lightly on the table.
“So, uh, Pam? There’s something I wanted to talk to you about.”
God, no. Please don’t let this be happening. Not again. Pam looks down at her hands, at the fading paint on her fingernails. She’s trembling.
“I never thought…when I came to Scranton…I thought I was coming for Jim. I was coming for Jim.” Karen laughs awkwardly. “I didn’t expect to…to find what I found here.” Pam steels herself, slowly lets her gaze trail up Karen’s body to her face. She looks gorgeous; tiny diamonds twinkle in her earlobes and her eye makeup is subtly smoky. She’s dressed up more than she usually bothers for dates, Pam realizes.
“I didn’t expect to find you,” Karen exhales softly. She clears her throat and looks Pam straight in the eyes. “I didn’t expect to find this…to find what we have. Honestly, I’m not even sure that I found it…it feels more like it found me.” Pam has to suppress a smile at that; she knows the feeling all too well.
“Basically, what I’m trying to say is…Pam, I love you. You know that. And…”
It all clicks in Pam’s head a moment before Karen unclasps her hand and she sees the small velvet box. Oh, my God. Her hand flies to her mouth as she gasps.
“Will you…God, this is so cheesy; I never thought I’d be the one…” Karen looks at her plate for a moment, then back up. A single tear slides down Pam’s face.
“Damnit, I’d better do this properly, huh?” Karen puts her hand out to steady herself and pulls herself out of her chair; she doesn’t seem to have the strength to get up without using the table for support (or maybe she’s just trembling too much). She fumbles with her skirt for a moment, flattens it about her knees, and then gingerly kneels on the ground. She opens her mouth and Pam sees everything in Karen’s eyes, in her tongue, in her teeth, in the dip of her collarbone and the satiny silk of her dress falling across her hips and the ridges of her ankles.
“Will you marry me, Pam?”
Pam’s arms are around her neck before Karen has the time to blink. She feels Pam’s hot tears trickling down her shoulder and into the crook of her elbow.
“Uh, not to interrupt or anything, but you haven’t answered yet-” Pam laughs breathily and wipes her eyes with the back of her hand.
“How are we going to explain this to Michael?”
Karen’s grin could light up the night sky.
(This…this will work, Pam realizes. This will work.)
3. The church is old. The walls are scratched, evidence of the countless number of paintings and crucifixes that have been hung and adjusted and taken down, and the backs of the pews are peeling from two hundred years’ worth of children scuffing their feet along the wood.
Karen’s nails are painted a light pink. They match the flower tucked behind her ear and the light blush dusting her cheeks (the former resemblance is intentional; the latter is not). The neckline of her dress falls just low enough to hint at the smattering of freckles across her chest.
It’s funny, Pam thinks, all of the women who plan their weddings down to the last detail and break down crying when the caterer puts periwinkle icing on their cake instead of light blue. She and Karen had laughed about these women one night when poring over some bridal magazines on their coffee table; they’d been reading some article about How Not to be a Bridezilla.
“I swear to God, Pam,” Karen had said after reading one particular awful story about a woman from New York named Mary-Ann who ended up putting her husband in the hospital with severe bruising and a broken toe after he made fun of her color palette choices. “If you go all abusive on me because I insist on roses instead of violets, I am calling this wedding off faster than you can say ‘Andy Bernard is a tool’.”
Pam snorted.
“Of course,” Pam said mildly a few minutes later, “the cake will say ‘Congratulations to Pam and Karen’, right? No ‘Karen and Pam’ B.S.”
Karen had blinked, then laughed, tucking a few loose strands of hair back into her messy bun.
“In yo’ dreams, Beesley,” she’d said with a grin.
Now, Pam thinks that she wouldn’t care if their cake was decorated with alfafa sprouts and Karen had walked down the aisle in a clown suit. Hell, even Roy and Jim showing up to crash the wedding wouldn’t deter her now. It’s just her, Karen, a few layers of white silk, and the rings glinting on their fingers-these are the only things in the world, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
She hears the pastor say something about pronouncing them wife and wife, but her heart is pounding so hard in her ears she can’t make out the words. And then it doesn’t matter because Karen is kissing her, hard, right on the mouth, tongue and all-in front of their parents, oh God, and Michael, who insisted on getting an invite and is now whooping appreciatively in the front row next to a dumbfounded Jim and a leering Ryan.
(“We’re married,” Karen says to her that night, when there’s nothing between them at all, when it’s just skin and sweat and curves pressing together.
“I know,” Pam replies. Her jaw aches from smiling so hard.
“I know.”)
4. It’s one of those mornings where your eyelids are thick and your head feels full of cotton and everything comes a little slowly. Pam wrinkles her nose and blearily flings her arm over Karen’s side, leaning in to snuggle into her warmth and - Karen isn’t in bed. Pam blinks and rolls over.
Her own untamed early morning curls frame her vision of the dark-haired silhouette against the window, wearing a sports bra and some old plaid pajama pants, tracing patterns in the frost on the glass with her pinky.
She grumbles but climbs out of bed all the same; Karen's skin warms her better than the bedsheets anyhow. Pam leans over to plant a kiss on her lips, but Karen turns her head to the side so Pam hits her cheek instead.
“Morning breath,” Karen grins softly. Pam glares at her. Five minutes and some toothpaste later, she’s back with two mugs of cocoa and a ratty old blanket from the couch. This time Karen pulls her down, pressing her lips to Pam’s with a hint of insistence. Pam moans slightly and tangles her hand into Karen’s hair, but Karen lightly swats it and pulls away from the kiss.
“I’m busy,” she murmurs, pointing to the window. “Join me?”
“I could never deny you anything,” Pam replies with a playful grin. Karen gives her hips a little wiggle.
“Damn straight. Now c’mere, you.” She pats her pajama-clad lap. Pam settles herself down onto it, grinding her ass slightly against Karen’s thighs.
“Uhnn,” she sighs. “Later, okay?” She can see the pout on Pam’s face reflected frostily back at her in the window and it makes her giggle. Pam allows her face to relax into a smile, lightly bringing her foot around to stroke Karen’s ankle softly. She lifts her fingertips to the windowpane and drags them through the frost, joining the intricate little patterns Karen’s already created in the mist.
-
By the end of the morning, their windowsill is a frosted paradise of city streets, bursting with peeling old signs and hipster kids and Indian restaurants, framed by a skyline of mountains and airplanes, silhouetted against a setting sun. There are two figures standing on the sidewalk, hands interwoven; they’re almost indistinguishable, but a closer look reveals the trademark curly hair of one Pam Beesly, which means the other one has to be Karen.
Pam surveys their frosty artwork, then quirks her eyebrow.
“That isn’t Scranton,” Pam says. A moment of inspection by Karen, and then she nods.
“Nope. It sure isn’t.”
Pam climbs off of Karen’s lap and slides down onto the floor, resting her head on Karen’s knees.
“Where is it, do you think?” Karen lightly brushes Pam’s hair off of her face.
“Wherever we want it to be, I guess,” she says slowly. Pam smiles and leans in, kisses Karen’s belly button, slides her hands up to Karen’s sports bra and tugs at it insistently. Karen grins and pulls it over her head. Her nipples immediately perk as the cold air filtering in through the window hits them head on. Pam bends down and takes one into her mouth, warming it with her tongue.
“I was thinking…Seattle?” Karen says, her eyes glazing over slightly. Pam releases her nipple with a soft pop and moves over to lavish her attention on Karen’s other breast. Karen lazily tangles her fingers in Pam’s hair, making a soft mewling noise as Pam’s hand comes up to tweak at the nipple her mouth isn’t suckling. It’s not hurried; they have all morning - all afternoon if they really want it, even - they have all the time in the world, as cliché as it sounds, and Pam intends to use it; she intends to keep Karen right here until their mystery city has long faded from the windows.
Soon they’ve moved to the bed; Pam’s sliding down Karen’s body lithely, pushing her hands between Karen’s now naked thighs and parting them to give herself access. Karen’s wet, open, ready. The sight of her swollen folds sends a familiar warmth to pool in Pam’s belly and there’s a wetness growing between her own legs now, but that’s not important. This is.
She bends over and lightly drags her tongue up Karen’s slit, then down again, tasting the wetness on her tongue, tasting Karen. Karen’s hand tangles in the comforter and she moans softly; she’s not a loud person during sex, so Pam takes it as a good sign and nips ever so gently at Karen’s clit.
“Oh, Pam,” she gasps, clawing at the covers. “Pam.” Pam looks up lazily, eyes dark, pupils dilated.
“What were you saying about Seattle, Karen?” Pam says dreamily; one finger dips down, coats itself in Karen’s wetness, and slides into her before she can respond.
Karen makes an incoherent noise and grinds herself against Pam’s finger. Her walls are slick, warm; Pam quickly adds a second finger, then stills them both.
“I said, what were you saying about Seattle? I really am…curious to know,” she says. Karen grunts and swirls her hips, but Pam doesn’t budge.
“I was saying that maybe…that maybe that’s our city - uhn,” she gasps. Pam’s thrusting her fingers now and sucking lightly on Karen’s clit as she does so; Karen’s surprised she’s so close, she usually takes longer to come, but sure enough, she’s clenching around Pam’s fingers and her walls are spasming and she’s moaning and thrashing and she’s there, oh, Jesus Christ.
When she finally forces her eyes open she sees Pam still kneeling between her legs, a sly, satisfied grin on her face. She slides her fingers out, reveling in the slick sound they make as she brings them to her mouth and begins to suck, her tongue swirling sensuously.
“Seattle it is, then,” she says triumphantly.
They move into their first apartment in Fremont three weeks later.
5. In the end, they decide that Pam will be the one to get pregnant but they’ll use Karen’s egg. “That way, we’ll both be a part of the baby,” Karen smiles, and it’s one of those beautiful romantic moments that bring tears to Pam’s eyes and a smile to her face and a heavy thrumming to her heart.
Everyone warns them that artificial insemination isn’t easy. It can take hundreds of times to get it right, Karen’s mother says. You have to make sure the sperm is healthy, Pam’s mom reminds them. Oh my God, will you be, like, putting some random guy’s jizz in you?! Kelly yells over the phone.
“Why can’t I just impregnate you myself?” Karen mutters after another bit of well-meaning but nonetheless annoying advice, this time from her brother’s wife. She’s lying on the couch with her head in Pam’s lap and her feet up on the armchair. Pam chuckles.
“I don’t know. I mean, everyone else I know can just grow a pair of testicles on command; why can’t you?” Karen shoots her a look and Pam leans forward to press a kiss to the top of her forehead, then resumes running her hand through Karen’s hair. The look on Karen’s face remains troubled, however; her forehead is creased and she’s biting her lip hesitantly. Pam inhales, then taps Karen lightly on the nose to get her attention.
“Hey, Karen,” she murmurs. “Look at me.” Karen grunts but obligingly pushes herself to a semi-seated position. “No, no, no, look at me,” Pam says, tilting Karen’s chin up and locking their eyes together. Karen’s face softens almost immediately.
“This is going to work. I am going to get pregnant and then I’m going to throw up and beg you to go get me pickles at three in the morning and make you massage my swollen ankles and complain about how much my boobs hurt and by the time nine months rolls around we’ll both be begging the kid to come out already and then it’s going to come out, perfectly healthy, with a great big set of lungs that’ll keep us up all night and a constantly dirty diaper and we’ll say, ‘Why the hell did we want a kid, anyway?’ but we’ll look it in the eyes and it’ll be so beautiful and it’ll be ours. Ours, Karen.” Pam takes a deep breath. “Okay, sweetie?” She never uses terms of endearment - neither of them do, really - but it feels right here, somehow.
“Okay, baby,” Karen breathes. “Okay.”
(Five days later, when they’re leaning over the third positive pregnancy test in as many hours, Pam can’t resist telling Karen I told you so.)
6. “I can’t see anything,” Karen whines.
“That’s the point of the blindfold,” chuckles Pam. “You’re almost there.” Her hand rests on Karen’s waist, leading her gently.
“Why am I letting a seven-month pregnant woman guide me, blindfolded, through my apartment building? I mean, no offense, but that belly of yours has taken away a bit of your coordination.” Karen grins; she can’t see, but she knows Pam is sticking her tongue out at the back of Karen’s head.
“You’re right. You can find your own way.” Pam abruptly removes her hand. Karen wobbles on her feet.
“Hey, hey! Not fair.” Pam giggles.
“I love your pouty face. But I’m kidding; you can take the blindfold off, now,” she says.
“Yay!” Karen’s hands reach up and tug the blindfold impatiently off of her face, which immediately softens as her eyes adjust to the candlelight. Their tiny kitchen table is totally decked out, complete with lacy tablecloth, matching lacy napkins, and two wine glasses (one full of Merlot, one full of Diet Coke). Pam’s made Karen’s favorite - a huge Italian dinner.
“Oh, Pam,” she sighs. “You really didn’t have to do this.”
“Bullcrap.” Pam waves her hand in the air. “It’s your birthday. Of course I did.”
“You must have worked on this all day when I was at work!” Karen exclaims. “Look at this! Oh, Pam.”
Pam grins softly up at her.
“You like it?”
Karen snorts and shakes her head, then envelops Pam in a giant hug, reaching around her big belly to rub her back.
“Of course I do, you goof. But you must be exhausted! Standing up all day in the kitchen. Weren’t you just saying that your feet were bugging you?”
“Pshaw,” Pam responds. “They’re just swollen. I’m pregnant, Karen. It kind of comes with the territory.”
Karen’s looking at her strangely now, and Pam’s eyebrow asks her a silent question as it raises.
“I just…you’re pregnant, aren’t you?”
Pam steps back and takes a look at Karen. Her nose is red. Little tears are starting to make their way down her face.
“Hey! Hey, hey, hey. What’s going on?”
“No, nothing. Nothing! Just…hearing you say it. It was…” Karen grins through her tears. “It sounds really, really nice.”
Pam’s heart thumps in her chest. Her pinky gently wraps itself around Karen’s.
“It does. I’m sure Baby likes the sound of it, too,” she says softly, tugging on Karen’s hand and guiding her to the table. Karen sits down and then looks up at her, eyes wide with wonder. She grabs Pam’s chin and pulls her down, insistently pressing their lips together as she reaches forward to rest her hand lightly on Pam’s belly.
“Yeah. Baby likes it,” Karen says softly. “Our Baby.”
7. Midway though her second set of pushes, Pam realizes that having a baby is not at all like the moves make it seem.
Karen’s clutching her hand so hard it hurts, looking tired and strained and almost frantic with worry; she only has an earring in one of her lobes, having forgotten to grab the other loop on the way out the door.
Pam’s hair hangs over her eyes in limp strands, furthermore obscuring her vision (already blurred by the tears of exertion clouding her eyes). Her chest feels tight, constricted somehow, and the feeling only increases with every push. Right now, Karen’s hand feels like the only thing keeping her moored in reality; she’s terrified that if she lets go, she’ll float off into a hazy world of pushing and crying and never come back.
(She nearly breaks one of Karen’s fingers, but Karen never tells her. Pam doesn’t ask about the splint Karen wears on her pinky for the next two weeks.)
“The baby’s never going to come out, Karen,” Pam moans. “It’s never, ever, ever, ever going to come out. It’s just going to get stuck in here and never going to-”
“Pam,” Karen murmurs, trying to keep her voice soft, calm, but failing miserably; it’s laced with tension and nervousness. “Pam. Just…remember why we did this. Okay? We did this because we wanted a baby. We wanted to have someone else in our life. We wanted to give someone else love; we wanted to make the world a better place for a little you. Or a little me. So I know this is hard for you, and believe me, it’s hard for me, too, but I just need you to push, just a little more, okay? It’s all going to be fine. I just-need you-to-”
“Karen, shut up or you are changing diapers for a year,” Pam hisses.
“O-kay!” Karen exclaims. “Shutting up.”
The doctor casts her a sympathetic glance; Karen shrugs. She wants to tell the doctor Pam’s always been a feisty one, but somehow she doesn’t think Pam will appreciate that at the moment. So instead she clams up, just gripping Pam’s hand (well, really she’s just letting Pam grip her hand and clenching her teeth from the pain) and biting her lip and hoping, wishing, even praying-which she stopped doing years ago-that this will be okay.
(It is, of course, more than six hours later, when Claire Beesley-Fillipelli comes into the world at eight pounds, seven ounces, bright pink and screaming her little lungs out. Pam wipes the hair out of her eyes, still gasping, looking more exhausted than Karen’s ever seen anyone look, but she’s smiling. It’s kind of incredible, actually, that smile, and the way it brightens up the whole room, and really, Pam, as if Karen needed another reason to remember why she married you right now, when you’ve already just given birth to her baby, but there it is. Pam Beesley’s megawatt smile, otherwise known as the reason for Karen Fillipelli’s existence on this earth.
Well, one of the reasons. The other one being the little bundle of screaming, chubby joy the doctor is currently placing softly into Pam’s open arms.
Karen grins and bends down to kiss first her daughter, then her wife, on the forehead.)
8. The sun doesn’t always shine through their window. Instead, Pam is getting used to the soft, insistent pounding of raindrops on the roof; she doesn’t admit it, but she finds it almost comforting. And while they get less snow than one might expect in Seattle, there have been a handful of mornings where they have to tread carefully through the powder on their lawn out to get the mail.
Claire cries often, which they both know is normal for a five-month old, but that doesn’t stop Karen from worrying herself sick. Surprisingly, she’s proven herself to be the overprotective parent; Pam would be happy just letting Claire lie around gurgling on the couch all day, but Karen insists on playing Mozart CDs while she sleeps, putting a baby monitor in every room in the house-Pam finds it exhausting, sometimes, to keep up with her, but she knows it’s all out of love for their baby, and for Pam, and for this little life they’ve made. So at the end of the day, she doesn’t mind all the hectic phone calls Karen makes to the doctors’ office at three a.m. wondering what the little rash is on Claire’s rear end. (Much.)
Even with Mount Saint Helens obstructing her view, her horizon -their horizon - still looks bigger than ever before.
And that, even on their worst days, has Pam smiling.