Chapter 6: Pam

† January 2020.

“I have to ask, Nate, what position did you play?”

“I was a tight end, Drake, but only in high school. I didn’t play in college. And, before you ask, I got badly injured before I graduated; that was the end of football for me.”

“Must have been bad. Sorry. I got off on a tangent. This is your new office. We’re expecting great things from you, Nate. I’m sure you won’t let us down. I won’t rehash from your promotion letter your new salary and benefits. Here at Apogee-Markham, you’re my direct report, we’re going to be in frequent contact, and you know where my office is. You remember my administrative assistant, Elena Juarez?”

“Of course, with the long hair.”

“Yeah. I asked her husband about it once. He said it takes a half an hour just to wash it all. Anyway, at your new level you also need an admin, I’ve asked her to join us, oh, and here she is. Pamela Norden, this is Nathaniel Kaiser.”

“I’m happy to meet you, Pamela, please call me Nate.”

“Of course, Nate, and I’m Pam. I was actually working here last year for Wilma Norris before she retired.”

“Really? That’s great, you can nurse me, uh, sorry, guide me, ah, to learn the ropes here.”

After a couple of silent beats, Drake filled the yawning conversational gap.

“I’d better get back, Elena says I have a meeting at 9:30. If either of you have questions or issues my door is always open.”

After he left, Nate looked uncomfortable.

“Pam, I’m sorry, that was a poor choice of words.”

“Hey, it’s fine. Let’s sit for a minute.”

There was a small sofa on the side wall of the office, and she gestured for him to join her there.

“You’re male and straight, you’re going to react. It’s not a surprise to me, Nate. I had C cups when I was 13; now they’re double D’s. I would go nuts if I let it bother me every time they got noticed. Almost everyone does and if they’re polite about it like you were, then ‘no harm no foul.’”

“Still, I should apologize, Pam.”

She smiled, adorably. For a moment, he was dazzled.

“Let’s be honest, Nate, OK? I have been watching you closely since I walked in here. You have been doing your damnedest to keep your eyes up and off my chest the whole time.

“That impresses me, it does. You’re making an effort so that I will be comfortable. Most men aren’t like that. Some of them are just one lip short of all-out drooling on me. And if they aren’t undressing me with their eyes (or, God forbid, their hands), then verbally they are being anywhere from crude to vulgar.

“You, Mr. Kaiser, made the smallest little verbal slip and then were immediately contrite. That tells me you are as nice inside as you are on the outside. Oh, uh, my turn to slip. My apologies to—”

“Julie. Although she would agree with you, much to my embarrassment. She calls me her ‘trophy husband’ when we’re out together.”

“Oh, that’s fun. Do you have a picture?”

“There’s one in the box of my stuff on the desk, here, let me show you.”

Carefully, he stood and walked over to the desk with his back to her. Discreetly, he checked his suit pants because he hoped he wasn’t bulging. He retrieved the framed photo of the two of them standing (taken at a party) and handed it to her.

There was no big bulge, but what Pam noticed was that he had checked himself.

“Hot! He is polite, but he can’t help his attraction to my girls. Good thing he hasn’t noticed my microscopic bottom and spindly legs.”

“Oof! Julie is gorgeous! Oh, my, she is so much shorter than you, though. Do you get teased about it?”

Nate relayed the wedding cake story to her.