He buys the ring because she hasn’t sent him into the supermarket to buy her tampons in a while.

He buys the ring because maybe he doesn’t want to have to always think of himself as the guy who only proposed because he knocked up his girlfriend.

He may be a lot of things, but he's not that guy. At least not yet.

He’s terrible at changing diapers, but maybe he could be someone’s father. He’d have to learn, of course. The whole reason he hadn’t gotten her that puppy she wanted so badly was that he knew he’d be the only one taking it out.

He's thinking away the eight hours of mind-numbing boredom he has to endure five days a week by conjuring up images of how Kelly will react… how she’ll smile and scream and hug him and do that thing that she… does sometimes.

He’s thinking then of how she’ll probably type up a bulleted list of reasons why Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson didn’t make it, things that they should avoid.

1. Don’t do a reality TV show.

He laughs because he knows that it’s a little too late on that front.

He thinks of how he'll tell his mother. How he'll bring her to a family dinner and everyone will congratulate him and hug her.

He thinks his tie is on too tightly, wondering why the fabric is straining against his Adam’s apple all of the sudden.

He’s not ready. Not for babies, not for weddings. Not for something borrowed, something blue. Not for how he’ll have to ask her father for permission and map out the 10-year plan that he doesn’t yet have.

He wonders if loving that someone loves you is the same thing as loving them back.

He's pretty sure that it is.

He grips the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles are turning white.

“Could you pull in here?” she asks him and he’s too busy freaking out inside his head to ask why.

He stops the car and waits as she reapplies her lip gloss. Diapers. Formula. Hell, he could barely stomach watching that Hannah woman pump her breast at work let alone…

            “Ryan?”

He looks at her and hopes that she can’t read what he’s thinking. The weight of the seatbelt has the ring-box pressing against his thigh and he thinks maybe it will leave a bruise.

            “Could you just run inside and grab me some tampons?”

He stumbles out of the car without protesting (she’s probably a little thrown by that, usually it’s a ten minute debate about why he has to go in instead of her, a debate that he always manages to lose).

He tries not to sprint or skip down the aisles.

He could return it and go buy that Wii he’s been eyeing ever since the Xbox became obsolete.

He hears the cashier chuckling as he scans the Playtex box, shaking his head like he thinks he’s some kind of sap for buying his girlfriend a box of tampons. And that’s when he decides to keep it. The stone in it is pretty much insignificant in size because that’s basically all he could afford. But it’s pink, and it’s hers really, at least in all the ways that matter.

He keeps the ring because he’s not ready.

He keeps the ring because maybe someday he will be.