colette

colette013 @ 2008-08-13T19:18:00

2008-08-13T23:24:02Z

Title: Clay Pot
Pairing/Character: Jim; Jim/Karen; Jim/Pam
Rating: T
Summary: S3, set between Traveling Salesman and The Return
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: I own nothing related to The Office. Sadly.

‘We…’ Karen quickly amended, ‘I mean, I should have a party this weekend.’

colette013 @ 2008-06-29T20:32:00

2008-06-30T00:35:03Z

Title: August
Pairing: Jim/Pam
Word Count: 4551
Rating: M
Summary: The Brooklyn Bridge, a tiny elephant, dim sum, ancient Mayan princesses. Your basic Sunday in New York.

It’s an odd sensation, being suspended above the river like this.

colette013 @ 2008-06-29T20:25:00

2008-06-30T00:31:53Z

Title: One down, eleven to go
Pairing: Jim/Pam
Word Count: 2409
Rating: M
Summary: The first week is the longest. A visit.

He's early...

colette013 @ 2008-05-27T10:00:00

2008-05-27T14:10:03Z

Title: Without Swans or Fireworks
Pairing: Jim/Pam; Pam/Roy
Word Count: 1018
Rating: K+
Summary: Two proposals (Uber-romantic. Sometimes, you just have to go there.)

Without Swans or Fireworks

Close enough

The first time, there were no swans. They’d been at their fifth high school reunion, a picnic held in a local park with a manmade pond where there were supposed to be swans. It was famous for its swans. Pam didn’t see a single one all afternoon.

Roy had been in his element. His former swagger returned as their (his) old buddies slapped him on the back, the returning football hero with his mousy little girlfriend, whose name they couldn’t quite recall. There had been one or two people – friends from art class – that she’d lost touch with and was hoping to see, but they hadn’t shown up; they’d moved away or simply moved on.

Fueled by rekindled teenage bravado and cheap beer, Roy had popped the slurred question in a rowboat, surrounded not by swans but by algae. She vividly remembers its shocking yellow-green color, like something they might have grown in a petrie dish in biology class. The irony wasn’t lost on her at the time, but it wasn’t particularly funny either. The water smelled fetid in the late June heat wave and Roy had drunkenly fumbled the ring, almost dropping it overboard. Luckily, her reflexes were less impaired and she’d caught it just in the nick of time.

Somehow, she convinced herself that it was a romantic moment all the same. Or at least, close enough.

Plenty

When Pam woke up that morning, she found him wide-awake, propped on one elbow, watching her. They’d driven home from Toby’s going away party the previous night in silence, at a rare loss for words. She’d practically fallen into bed immediately after they arrived at her place, queasy from junk food and exhausted from the effort of willing herself not to be disappointed. By the time Jim had slid in behind her a little later, she’d been asleep, only vaguely aware of his arm winding around her waist, his body molding flush to hers.

‘Hey,’ she breathed blearily, rolling toward him and rubbing the sleep from her eyes.

‘It was supposed to be last night,’ he began abruptly, as if they were already in the middle of a conversation.

‘I know,’ she answered quietly.

‘But, I…’ he trailed off, obviously still mystified by how it had turned out like it did. Like it didn’t.

‘I know.’

Of course she did; she’d been there. She’d seen him turn to smile at her, vibrating with hope and nerves and take a deep breath for courage. She’d watched him deflate when the universe (in the form of Andy) conspired against him.

‘I just couldn’t… I mean, can you imagine having that moment forever linked with fucking Andy?’

His familiar early morning voice was low and lush and intimate - a warm secret she never tired of hearing. But now it sounded raw, like he hadn’t slept much. Maybe at all. Pam sighed, reaching out to push the crazy tangle of bed-head hair off his forehead. He caught her arm before she withdrew it, pressing dry lips to the inside of her wrist.

‘I’m so sorry,’ he murmured into her skin, so softly it was barely audible.

‘Well, Andy isn’t here now,’ she pointedly held his gaze when he looked back at her. ‘And I don’t need fireworks and swans…’

‘Swans?’

‘Yes…. no. It’s better this way.’

‘At eight a.m., practically naked?’ he chuckled incredulously, gesturing to the fact that that he was wearing only boxer shorts and she panties and a flimsy camisole.

‘Yeah, like Adam and Eve – kind of biblical.’

Jim exhaled deeply, flipping onto his back and staring at the ceiling a moment, before conceding, ‘Well, I guess it beats being like Andy and Angela. Maybe we should just be grateful he didn’t strip down for his proposal.’

Pam smiled, reaching down to weave their fingers together under the sheet. They lied quietly, the only sound their own breathing. There was no Andy, there was no one else at all, just them. And that was plenty.

After a few minutes when she thought Jim might be dozing, he suddenly gave her hand a quick squeeze. As if on impulse, he sprung up and walked decisively across the room to the chair where he’d thrown his jacket the night before.

‘Hold on,’ she exclaimed, sitting up and frantically pawing at the night. ‘I want to see this.’

She slipped on her glasses and he came into sharp focus just as he sank to one knee in front of her. His expression was at once brave and scared and certain and uncertain and maybe a little amazed at himself. He reminded her of a little boy poised at the edge of a high diving board, persuading himself one last time before leaping that the water beneath would offer a safe landing.

‘Pam…’ he cleared the gravel from his throat, ‘you know how much I love you…I mean, how long I’ve…’

She stared at him expectantly for a silent beat as he frowned slightly, shaking his head almost imperceptibly.

‘Know what? I had all this stuff I planned to say, but now I just….’ he paused again.

‘Marry me,’ he finally said, so simply and earnestly that her heart felt like a hot water balloon bursting in her chest. ‘Just, please. Say you will.’

And with that she was propelled forward off the bed, his arms catching her as they fell backwards to the floor from the force of it, the ring box tumbling out of his hand.

‘Should I take that as yes?’ he looked up at her, stunned and laughing.

His tone said he was joking, but even without her glasses - which had slid off upon impact - she could see he needed to hear her say it.

‘God you’re an idiot. Yes it’s yes…. yes yes yes yes yes yes…’ she repeated until it became an abstract sound, like a musical note. Like joy.

And then she was kissing him and he was kissing her and she couldn’t use words any more. But still, she was telling him yes.

********

colette013 @ 2008-03-03T16:54:00

2008-03-03T22:00:42Z

Title: Recognition
Pairing: Jim/Pam
Word Count: 1207
Rating: M
Summary: A barrette, a bra, a neck tie

Recognition

She’s not used to this yet, this absence of come on, come on, let’s go in the morning. It’s still the soundtrack in her head, as she sweeps out of the bathroom, hairbrush in hand, wearing only her skirt and bra. She simultaneously attempts to gather her hair into her barrette and locate her shoes, the apology for running behind at the tip of her tongue, like the twitch of a phantom limb.

Until she looks across the room and her eyes meet his.

He’s leaning calmly back against the pillows on the bed, already dressed save for a couple of open shirt buttons and the tie hanging unknotted around his neck. It’s obvious he’s in no hurry, as he watches her scurrying around the room. You’d think they had all the time in the world.

Roy’s impatience was understandable – after all, he’d had to clock-in at work. Jim risks only a dirty look from Dwight. Still, it’s a relief to no longer feel like everything – a warehouse clock, yet another beer, a pick-up truck horn honking – places her in a distant second.

She slows down.

‘Is that new?’ he gestures at her with his chin, smiling appreciatively.

Of course he means her black lace bra. It’s sheer and dips low and is very girly – no, womanly. She’d bought it on a whim last fall, in those heady days counting down to his return. When she’d expected…well, she wasn’t sure what she expected, but it wasn’t what was.

She’d gone home that first night, when he’d come back with someone else, someone who probably brought suitcases of sexy lingerie with her, and quietly folded the delicate black lace into a tiny bundle. She’d put it away. Sometimes while searching for something else in her underwear drawer, she’d catch a glimpse of it poking out amidst the pale pink and white (mostly cotton) underwear. She’d push it back to the bottom until it was buried, invisible again.

But today she’d dug it out impulsively and put it on, even though it really was a bit much to wear under her blouse, just to go to work.

‘Oh, this? No…’ she stammers. ‘I’ve had it for a while.’

Suddenly self-conscious, she loosely crosses her arms in front of her breasts. He frowns slightly, rubbing his thumb over his mouth as he takes her in, before getting up and coming over to her. He stands close enough that she can smell the herbal scent of his shampoo in his still damp hair. Close enough that she can hear him swallow hard as he tentatively runs one finger along the silky strap at her shoulder, hooking it underneath and giving it a gentle tug. She feels herself flush.

‘Yeah?’ his voice is low and intimate now. ‘Never seen it before.’

‘I never really wore it…it just didn’t seem like me, so…’

It’s difficult to finish her sentence, when he leans down to graze his lips against her neck.

‘Well, I like it,’ he murmurs, nuzzling just below her ear.

‘And it does…’ his mouth traces along her collar bone, ‘…seem like you.’

He nudges the strap off her shoulder, leaving a soft kiss in its place before concluding, ‘To me.’

She’s still learning to wear it, this version of herself. She knows she can get a reaction from him dressed in pastel cotton underwear and old sweatpants, but this is different. It’s strange and new and she’s not entirely sure what to do with it yet.

As he pulls her close, her hands instinctively go to him, moving over the contours of his stomach and sides. Even though it’s cool for a summer morning, his skin is hot against her palms, through the thin fabric of his shirt. He continues slowly kissing his way across the top slope of her breasts, leaving a light wet trail, until his tongue skims the satiny edge of her bra. His fingers slide up her back and begin working at the clasp

‘If you like it so much, why are you trying to take it off?’ she teases, almost to steady herself.

She’s as warm as he is now, that familiar flutter deep in her belly taking hold.

‘Guess I just can’t help myself,’ he chuckles, as the hooks finally come undone.

Before she can say anything more, his mouth covers hers, words dissolving against his tongue. She barely notices his hand traveling through her hair, until he pauses at her barrette. When he unfastens it, it feels like a tiny silent explosion. He draws back just enough to see her curls falling in waves around her shoulders, his eyes dark and unfocused.

‘We’re going to be so late,’ she warns, only by rote, staring hazily back at him.

It’s almost a drug, this not pretending not to want.

‘Do you care?’ he asks through ragged breath.

She forgets how to tell time.

‘No.’

There’s an almost imperceptible clink as the barrette hits the floor. A moment later, it disappears beneath the soft swish of satin and lace.

******************

They get dressed for the second time that morning. His unbuckled belt, the chaos of his hair tell the tale of how they spent the last half hour while they should have been on their way to work. The vibration of his surrendering moan is still fresh against her neck; the lush ache of him lingers inside her. When she buttons her blouse over the black lace, the sensitive skin on her chest and belly is still pink and alive from rubbing against his.

She imagines later, when the hours inevitably become mind numbing and all this seems light-years away. She’ll look over at him from her desk and their gazes will meet for a second, just like they did this morning. He’ll give her that same private smile. They’ll both know.

Retrieving his tie from where it landed, she walks over to him, stands on her tiptoes and threads it under his collar. He lets her. She remembers how her father taught her to knot a tie when she was a little girl. How grown up she’d felt helping him like that.

‘You’re a woman of hidden talents,’ he’d declare, feigning amazement every time.

But she knew he was only partially joking. It didn’t matter that she was far from a woman, that her talents were yet to be revealed.

Roy almost never wore a tie. When he did, he’d wrestle with it, quickly get frustrated and yell for her to come do it for him. When he looked at their reflection in the mirror as she corrected the mess he’d made, he only saw himself. If he looked at all.

‘How can you do that backwards?’ Jim asks, watching her form careful loops. He sounds impressed, as if she’s performing a magic trick.

She just shrugs. He’s clearly amused – he’s perfectly capable of tying his own tie - but there’s something else there too. Something like recognition.

‘There,’ she smiles as she finishes, adding with a flourish, ‘Ta da.’

Before they leave, she bends down and picks the barrette up off the floor. It’s pretty and silver and she’s had it forever.

She opens the top drawer of the dresser and puts it away.

**********

The Office: Fanfiction

2008-02-21T19:34:56Z

Title: Snip</a>
Pairing: Jim/Other; Jim/Karen; Jim/Pam
Word Count: 2202
Rating: T
Summary: Jim has three haircuts and finds his jump shot.

Snip

Part I: Haircut

When Jim was a kid, he visited the local barbershop whenever his mother decided he needed it. He really didn’t care, as long as the appointment didn’t make him late for Little League practice or miss a television show he wanted to see. Since he’d been old enough to be in charge of these things, Jim had only had two haircuts he’d describe as not entirely voluntary. While neither was exactly forced, calling them self-determined would be a stretch.

Jim had never been one to spend much time thinking about how his hair looked or to ascribe any particular importance to it. A quick comb run through it after his morning shower and shave typically sustained him until the next day. So the fact that it had assumed so much significance on two separate occasions struck him as a little ironic.

The first time was in his senior year of high school. He was the star of his school’s basketball team - in spite of himself, if he was being honest. It’s not that he wasn’t competitive; if anything brought that streak out in him it was the adrenaline rush of a close game. He had always loved to play, but the older he got, the less it felt like a destiny. He was the proverbial big fish in a small pond and that was fine with him. He had neither illusions of standing out beyond that nor the single-minded dedication it would take to get there. Now, the state championships loomed. Suddenly it all became Serious Business. He could feel his drive waning in inverse proportion to the increasing expectations.

Complicating matters, just as the team began gearing up for the championships, Tracy, his first serious girlfriend, finally – mercifully – decided to allow him to relieve them of their respective virginities. Jim found himself almost continually keyed up, but not about basketball. To say he was distracted was an understatement. As was claiming he’d only missed a couple of practices. Saying his coach was pissed off didn’t begin to describe the situation.

Shortly before the big game, the coach delivered a pep talk about discipline and purpose – the usual high school coach-speak. Furthermore, he announced that his players were looking unsuitably shaggy and asked them to get short haircuts. Very short ones. It was only a request in the rhetorical sense, delivered while staring Jim straight in the eye. The message was not subtle: the spotlight was on him to renounce his lackadaisical attitude and prove his allegiance to the team.

Problem was, Jim hated the prescribed near buzz cut. It would make his ears look huge and him feel like a fraud. Had there not been a possible college scholarship at stake, requiring his coach’s recommendation, he probably would have balked. But, the unanimous wisdom of his parents and friends was that the payoff was too desirable to let slide. There were some opportunities you just didn’t walk away from. Did you?

‘It’s only hair, Jim. It will grow back,’ his mother reminded him when he expressed his dismay.

The only one who sympathized with his reticence was Tracy, and he suspected that was because she was given to grabbing onto his hair, as if for dear life, when they were in the thick of it.

‘Trace, you okay?’ he’d pant, worried that the sounds she was making beneath him meant she was in pain. ‘Am I hurting you?’

He guessed he wasn’t, because when he’d pause and try to hold still for a second she’d only gasp, don’t stop. So he didn’t. Luckily, his lack of hair didn’t seem to deter her from their self-taught crash course in Teen Sex 101. He continued to be an enthusiastic, if somewhat fumbling, study partner.

While the dreaded haircut did nothing to diminish his hormonally induced fugue state and refocus him on basketball, it did seem to signal to his coach that his heart and mind were back in line. In the end, he played hard, but his team lost the championship anyway. Jim was just glad that the coach couldn’t blame it on his unruly hair. He figured it didn’t really matter if he secretly felt like he was just going through the motions.

After all, coach knew what was best.

Snip

Part II: Another Haircut

Jim’s second not quite voluntary haircut occurred years later. Once again, it was an act of acquiescence. Of getting back on track after being unexpectedly derailed. Blindsided one night around a campfire by a lake, when a door he’d believed was sealed shut had suddenly been flung open.

Problem was he’d attempted to cross that threshold before. It had been impenetrable. It had been awful. He wouldn’t have wished that on his worst enemy - and that included himself.

So, this time, Jim had done the sensible thing – made a conscious decision to stick with the program. He was lucky to have Karen, lucky she still wanted him on her team despite his less than stellar performance as a boyfriend. Like all his coaches had told him, the thing was not to over-think it. He knew the drill: all he had to do was follow her lead and memorize the plays. There was even a uniform, though his expensive new suit and tie were considerably less comfortable than his old basketball shorts and jersey.

All week, he’d watched Karen struggle to pretend everything was fine. That they were still – had ever been - poised to win. Together. As good as her game face was, however, the score was painfully obvious. He tried to reassure her, but she wasn’t one for vagaries. So, when she said she thought he should get a haircut, he didn’t resist.

‘You want Wallace to hire you, not throw a quarter in your cup, right?’ she’d teased him. ‘Cause you’ve got a serious homeless thing going on with that hair, Halpert.’

It seemed to make her happy to arrange it, to watch his new corporate image emerge as piles of his hair accumulated on the salon floor (no more ordinary barbershops.) He was just relieved to see her smile again. He owed her that; at least that. It was only hair, after all.

He’d quite literally played ball with the CEO before, he could do it again. He figured if he kept feigning interest, eventually he’d stop feeling like he was dressed and groomed to play a part. He’d actually become that guy. It was a proven fact: with practice, you can become a better shooter. He concentrated on ignoring something he also knew to be true: certain things, like a great jump shot, are simply in your bones. You can’t will them into being. Nor can you talk yourself in or out of love. He worked hard at not knowing that either.

Funny thing about that haircut. When it was finished, Karen and the hairdresser stood back beaming, admiring how ‘sophisticated’ Jim now appeared. But when he looked in the mirror, all he saw reflected there was himself as a child, after his mother had licked her palm and smoothed away the cowlicks in his freshly cut big-boy hair, making him look ‘presentable’ enough to go to a church youth group mixer or to a Boy Scout awards ceremony. Someplace he knew he didn’t really belong.

Karen knew how to play the game. She cared about him. She knew what was best.

Snip

Part III: Samson and Delia

Jim needed a trim. The first night of his Sports Journalism class (no pressure, just testing the water, Pam kept reassuring him) the instructor had asked if he was a college student. It might have been his jeans and untucked shirttails, but he was pretty sure it was mostly his hair. As usual, it had been a while between cuts. He wanted it cleaned up enough to clear his collar and get it out of his eyes, but not enough to look like the poster boy for corporate America. He asked Pam her opinion on the matter, but she didn’t seem to want him to look any way in particular.

‘You looked really handsome with your fancy pants hair, but there was nothing to hold on to,’ she’d equivocated.

Pam shared Tracy’s tendency to wind her hands in his hair at heated moments, but it was abundantly – fantastically - clear it had nothing to do with being in pain. And though he hadn’t been this enthusiastic himself since was a teenager, he’d thankfully long since outgrown his fumbling phase. Curled up on the sofa in front of a TV show, or late at night in the dark, drowsily discussing everything and nothing, he’d mention scheduling a haircut. As if on cue, Pam would run her fingers over his scalp and it would feel so damn good he’d forget why he ever thought he needed a trim. He’d forget his own name.

After listening to him repeatedly bring it up for a couple of weeks, but not get around to doing anything about it, Pam ended his procrastination by volunteering to cut it herself. She claimed to have done it before (he didn’t want to know for whom.) She even arranged to borrow good scissors and an electric clipper from Kelly, who’d apparently once attended beauty school for twenty minutes before realizing her interests ran more toward being on the receiving end of the primping.

By the time Kelly remembered the equipment was in her bag the next day, Pam had already left work a little early to go to her graphics class. So she brought it to Jim instead.

‘Oh my god, Jim! You must love Pam so much,’ she exclaimed. ‘I mean, cutting crazy thick hair like yours is really hard and she has no idea what she’s doing. She’ll probably butcher it and you’ll look totally ridiculous.’

‘Great.’

‘You know how people say the eyes are the window to the soul? Wrong. Your hair is. Why do you think I got this sassy little bob?’

‘Yup,’ he nodded. ‘Makes sense.’

‘Exactly. And, no offense, Jim,’ she continued consolingly, ‘but that haircut you got last spring when you blew the corporate job? You looked hot and everything, but it was just so not you. You looked like some soap opera yuppie guy…’

‘M’kay….thanks.’

‘Anyway, letting Pam cut your hair is so romantic…like Samson and Delia.’

‘Delilah.’

‘What?’

‘De…uh, nothing,’ he decided to cut his losses, reaching for the implements of his hair’s prophesized destruction. ‘I’ll make sure Pam gets these.’

When Pam got home from class that night, she went to change out of her work clothes while Jim set a kitchen chair in the middle of the room and took off his tee shirt, so it wouldn’t get covered in hair. When she returned, she was wearing a tank top and his old boxer shorts that had shrunk too small to fit him, but were still huge on her. They hung low, exposing a few of inches of belly and rounded hips beneath the hem of the shirt. He fought the urge to put his hands there to feel how soft and warm it was; he could tell by the way she was scrutinizing his head that she meant business.

Manning the scissors, she approached with conviction, ready to attack. She moved around him, frowning in concentration as she clipped away. Every few minutes, she’d stand back squinting to assess her progress. Snip, snip, snip at the back. Then the buzzing of clippers. He couldn’t see what she was doing. Maybe Kelly was right and Pam was in over her head. He didn’t care. Snip, snip, buzz and the sides were done. It was only hair.

She straddled his legs to finish the top, pressing the inside of her thighs against his to steady herself. It felt like foreplay. Sometimes everything between them did. He imagined later, sweeping up the floor and then showering the itchy clippings off his shoulders and back. Maybe she’d get in with him. Maybe she’d wait for him in bed. Maybe nothing was impossible.

‘Enjoying the view there?’ she smirked, looking down at him.

He didn’t realize he’d been staring, but as she leaned over him, her thinly covered breasts were only inches away, precisely at eye level.

‘Don’t know what you’re talking about,’ he felt his face flushing hot, caught in the act. ‘Okay, maybe a little.’

‘Just like at the barbershop, huh?’ she chuckled, taking the last few snips.

‘Hmm… kind of a Hooter’s barbershop. I like it.’

‘Good thing you’re taking that class,’ Pam concluded, setting down the scissors. ‘You’ve obviously been working for Michael too long.’

Jim just grinned and leaned into her, gliding his hands over the exposed skin at her waist until his arms were wrapped tightly around her. Pulling her closer, he rested his cheek against her chest. When he tugged her, just barely, she yielded instantly. She sunk down into his lap, letting her forehead lean against his.

‘You look good,’ she said quietly, her lips almost touching his, fingertips strumming through his freshly cut hair.

It felt like defying gravity, air beneath his feet, the ball swooshing through the rim.

It was in his bones. He knew it.

The Office: Fanfic

2008-02-18T12:29:10Z

Title: The New Happy
Pairing: Jim/Karen
Word Count: 1664
Rating: M
Summary: For just a brief second, he feels almost happy. Or at least not unhappy. Maybe the absence of unhappiness is the new happy. (S3; no spoilers.)

The New Happy

Karen is an excellent cook. She’s taken classes with names like La Technique and Pastry Arts and Alsatian Wine Pairing. As with most things that interest her, she’s done her homework and it shows. She knows her way around whisks and knives and all sorts of mysterious gadgets whose purposes Jim can’t begin to guess.

The dishes she makes usually have foreign names that roll impressively off her tongue - not that he’d know the difference, but it sounds right and who cares beyond that? Cassoulet; Risotto alla Milanese; Galette aux something or other. They’re often complicated and take hours to prepare. He’s sent on missions to procure the prescribed ‘Super Tuscan’ or Riesling whose unpronounceable German name contains three too many syllables and a confounding ratio of consonants to vowels.

‘Better write it down,’ he warns when she specifies the bottle he’s supposed to find.

‘Well, duh,’ she chuckles indulgently, in that way that makes him feel something between grateful and irritated.

He makes a choice to go with the former.

‘I know who I’m dealing with,’ she winks, handing him his car keys and the printed out directions to a far off wine shop, his orders neatly written on the back.

Nothing is left to chance.

He’s never been a picky eater and he truly appreciates the effort she puts into making these dinners for him. For them. It’s usually just them; the one time he’d suggested inviting someone else over, she’d looked vaguely hurt, as if he was avoiding a romantic evening alone. Maybe she was right, he wasn’t sure, but he was sure he didn’t want to make her feel bad. He never brought it up again.

Anyway, she really didn’t have any friends in Scranton besides him. And frankly, he doesn’t have many left here either - just the guys he plays ball with; his old roommate Mark, though he doesn’t see him much these days; and one or two high school chums with whom he barely keeps up.

He had a best friend once.

He hasn’t exactly gone out of his way to introduce her around, but so far Karen hasn’t liked any of his friends she’s met. She’s never said anything, but he can tell. She’s easy to read, and for that he truly is grateful. Reading comprehension, he’s learned the hard way, is not his strength. He thinks she might like a couple of his friends’ girlfriends or wives, and fleetingly considers getting everyone together, having a potluck or something at his place. But that just doesn’t feel like the kind of thing he and Karen do.

Maybe it would be different if her friends lived nearby. He’s pretty sure she likes them, or at least she seems to when she describes their high-powered jobs and savvy real estate purchases and truffle hunting expeditions to Umbria.

‘Is that near where they make the official drink of Italian super heroes?’ he asks.

She rolls her eyes, but she still laughs. The next time she asks him come to New York to meet her friends at some restaurant where you need to know someone just to wait for your table at the bar for two hours, he resolves not to make lame excuses.

He adds that to the long list of things he should do.

‘What’s the best meal you ever had?’ Karen asks one night at her apartment, half way through a bottle of red wine that really is delicious, even if he can’t quite muster the reverence the price seems to demand.

‘Uh,’ he thinks a moment, then gestures to the meticulously prepared dish in front of him. ‘This?’

‘Right,’ she laughs warmly, reaching across the table to squeeze his hand.

Good answer, he thinks; she seems to appreciate him saying it, even though she obviously knows it’s not true.

‘No seriously,’ she presses, releasing his hand in favor of her wineglass. ‘You must have had one, somewhere, that was memorable.’

He thinks about burnt hot dogs and s’mores washed down with bug juice (flavor: red) at summer camp when he was a kid. He thinks about eating this insanely good Chinese noodle thing straight from the carton while sitting on his sofa watching a game, on the rare nights he gets to himself these days. Sometimes if there’s no new game on, he watches an old one on ESPN Classics. It’s a little crazy - despite already knowing the outcome, he actually finds himself hoping his team will win. Even when he knows how badly they’ve already lost.

He thinks about grilled cheese sandwiches on the roof.

‘Let’s see…’ he searches for another good reply. ‘I guess the dinner my mother always made for my birthday.’

He goes with that: neutral and not far from the truth.

‘Which was?’ she asks, her voice throaty and pleased.

Their eyes meet across the table and maybe it’s the alcohol, but the veil of distrust he often sees there lifts slightly. For just a brief second, he feels almost happy. Or at least not unhappy. Maybe the absence of unhappiness is the new happy.

He thinks maybe he’s getting the swing of this.

‘A barbecue,’ he continues. ‘Ribs and this really good cornbread she makes, with some kind of cheese and stuff in it. And devil’s food cake.’

He kind of wishes that’s what he was eating right now, but he keeps that part to himself. She smiles, charmed.

‘Maybe I should call her for the recipe,’ she says brightly.

‘Oh…. no, I mean…it’s just this thing she…yeah,’ he stutters, forcing a weak grin to mask his sudden queasiness.

The scrim descends across Karen’s eyes again, as she – barely perceptibly - deflates. Relieved when she deftly changes the subject, he pours some more wine. He hopes it will quell the dull ache in his chest that has nothing to do with rich food.

************

Karen is good in bed. Frequently, very. She knows a thing or two and isn’t shy about showing him. She’s also vocal about what she wants him to do. It threw him off his game a bit the first couple of times they slept together, but he’s gotten used to it. In some ways likes it – she’s not pushy, just precise. It kind of takes the pressure off. There’s less guesswork involved. Sometimes he feels like he just needs to show up and rise to the occasion, as it were. That’s a piece of cake; he’s a boy after all and she’s sexy as hell when she stares him in the eye without ambiguity.

‘Why don’t you stay over tonight,’ she says, already unbuttoning his shirt as the DVD ends.

Before he can answer, she’s up and walking towards the bedroom, pausing to step out of her jeans. Her panties are black lace. Things with Karen are only complicated when he thinks too much.

It turns out, there are recipes to follow in bed too.

One Saturday morning she’s already gone to the gym by the time he wakes up. She’s very disciplined about that. He thinks about going for a run. Maybe. Later. Or not. As he’s dragging himself out of bed, he notices a book on her nightstand with an artsy photo of an entangled man and woman on the cover: What Real Men Really Want. He sits back down and flips through it; he often has trouble understanding what they want too. The corners of several pages are turned down, which doesn’t surprise him - when Karen wants to do something well, she does her research. Knowing he’s no exception touches him, even if he’s not sure he deserves it.

The book has step-by-step how-to diagrams. One well-thumbed chapter in particular catches his attention, entitled His Secret Hot Spots. There, in anatomically correct illustrations, is that thing she did with her tongue the previous night. Apparently, it has a name. Furthermore, the author notes that it’s a ‘no fail technique.’ He’s not crazy about the idea of sex as something you can ‘fail’ at, but he’s not going to get hung up on semantics. It worked, whatever it was. Still, he wishes he didn’t know it wasn’t an inspiration she’d had in the moment.

He tries hard not to think this way when he’s with Karen, but when he’s alone (after take-out Chinese and a basketball game with a foregone conclusion) he imagines long nights blurring into mornings, where it all just…happens. Where there’s impulse – messy and imperfect - instead of technique. He thinks of bodies colliding how they will and skin kissed or licked or stroked simply because resistance is futile. He thinks of someone he used to know, golden brown tendrils floating above him, soft luxurious breasts pressed against his chest as he pushes into her over and over and over again. Because it’s her and he just can’t stop. He thinks of abandon.

He thinks he’s an idiot.

He knows most guys would kill for what he has. Still, it’s weird that you can feel detached from someone while you’re literally inside her. Weird that you can feel lonely, then. He wonders if passion is just another childish idea he needs to get over.

‘Penny for your thoughts?’ Karen asks a few nights later, curling up next to him, afterwards.

‘Don’t waste your money,’ he answers a little more acerbically than he’d intended.

She raises her head and squints at him quizzically.

‘No…I’m just tired,’ he smiles apologetically, backtracking. ‘Not really thinking anything.’

He quickly kisses her forehead and reaches over to switch off the lamp, so she’ll lie down and go to sleep. Though he truly is exhausted, he’s unable to doze off. He lies motionless, trying not to think, for a long time, until his eyes almost adjust to the dark.

But not quite.

********