She’s unusually quiet when we get back in the car, her arms wrapped protectively around one knee as she gazes out the passenger window. She looks so vulnerable, so deep in thought and I rack my brain for something to ease the all-too consuming silence.

“Hey,” I say gently and she turns her head toward me. “There’s the marina.”

Her face lights up at the sight of the water. “I didn’t know you were so close to it.”

“Yeah,” I trail off. “Neither did I. Wanna go check it out?”

She nods earnestly and I pull into a nearby parking lot. The sun is climbing higher into the sky and taking the temperature with it, causing Pam to ditch her light cardigan and reveal freckled shoulders covered only by thin straps. I kneel down to roll up my jeans and look up towards her.

“The pier might be dirty, you don’t mind sitting in grime?” I tease, calling back to her aversion to dirt.

She shakes her head proudly. “I can take it. You’d be surprised how much I’ve changed over our little adventure, Jim. I’ve evolved.” She exaggerates the word and all I can do is roll my eyes is laugh.

“Good for you and your evolution. Now come on, dork.” I sling my arm around her shoulders playfully, and in a pleasant surprise, she doesn’t stiffen or pull away. If anything, I feel her relax more into my grip as we walk towards a string of shops lining the marina.

We exchange hellos with other people passing by, couples walking their dog or a mom jogging as she pushes a stroller. The normalcy of it all, the warm weather, getting to see the ocean for the first time in I don’t know how long; it’s more than enough to make my mood sky rocket and before I know it, I’m grinning like an idiot.

I’m not the only one who notices.

“Someone’s in a good mood,” Pam remarks with a grin of her own to match mine.

“I know. I can’t really explain it but I’m just…really happy.” I beam down at her, my arm still slung over her shoulders as we continue to walk with our eyes still locked on each other.

We pass by a convenience store and I halt in my tracks.

“What’s up?” Pam asks, troubled by the sudden stop.

“Wait here,” I say, jogging into the store, a small ding of a bell announcing my arrival. I head straight to the disposable cameras, grabbing the first one I see and hastily paying for it. She’s sitting on a bench just outside the store when I return, looking up at me curiously. I hold up my purchase proudly.

“I figure we need some visual evidence of this insane day.”

“Very nice! Good work, Halpert.” She unwraps it and winds it quickly, snapping a shot of me without any warning.

“Hey, we’ve only got 25 of those, gotta make them count.” I steal the camera from her and hold it up to my eye, willing her to pose. She giggles and blows and exaggerated kiss.

“Perfect,” I say, stuffing the camera into my front jean pocket. “Now let’s go check out that pier.”

We take off our shoes when we get to the end of it, dangling them over the water and dipping timid toes in every once in awhile.

“So,” I say after a few moments of silence. “What do you think of the day so far?”

“You want the truth?” She says it with such seriousness that I straighten up a little and forgo trying to makes shapes in the water with my foot.

“It feels like a date.” My only reaction is to cough a little and try and turn that into an innocent laugh. She’s smiling, weakly I admit, but still a smile so it can’t be all that bad.

“Well, yeah,” I stumble. “It does have some date-like qualities to it.”

“So if this were a date,” she continues and I wonder where in the hell this newfound confidence is coming from. “How would it end?”

The tricky part is trying to answer as though I haven’t thought of this a million times before.

“Let’s see…well, for starters, you would have had a bouquet of sunflowers by now because, you know, they’re your favorite. But uhh, I dunno, we’d probably eat a few more times because that’s what we do apparently.” She laughs and blushes a little but urges me to continue with pleading eyes. “Then I don’t know…maybe a movie? But an obscure one so no one would be in the theater and we could provide running commentary all we want, Mystery Science Theater 3000 style. Then it’d be getting late and I would know that I should take you home but I’m having such an amazing time that I’m going to be selfish and not even suggest it. We’d just…walk around, talk about things we’ve already talked about a million times before but it doesn’t matter because it always feels like a new story with you. But then it’d be like, really late and I’d know that I couldn’t just keep you up…much like I’m doing now.” I laugh nervously but she’s still looking quite serious and I continue. “So I’d take you back and walk to your door and umm…” Like an involuntary reaction, my eyes flee to her mouth and without thinking, I lick my lips.

“Then what?” she says quietly, and there’s such certainty in her voice that we both know exactly comes next.

And I could explain it to her. Sure I could, verbal communication is a good thing.

Then I catch a whiff of cherry chapstick and think that maybe verbal communication is over-rated.

Showing her would leave a much better impression.

So I lean in, my eyes leaving her mouth for just a moment to catch her eyes, to see if she’s recoiling in fear. But she’s not, and unless I’m seeing things, I’m pretty sure she’s leaning in too. My eyes drift close, my heart nearly exploding out of my chest, and our faces just inches apart so that I can almost taste the chapstick.

And then her phone rings.

The noise scares us both, causing us to jerk back in surprise. She fumbles in her purse with shaky hands for her phone.

“Hello?” she says a little breathlessly. I run a hand through my hair, catching a few dewdrops of sweat that collected on the back of my neck. What the hell did we almost just do?

“Uh huh,” she continues, fiddling with her necklace. “Yeah, sorry. We, umm, lost track of time. Okay, thank you.” She flips her phone shut and clutches it to her chest. “That was the realtor, she wanted to make sure we were still coming.”

I merely nod, keeping my head down and attention focused on the ripples projecting from my toe in the water.

She gets up before I do, walking a few steps away.

“Ready?”

“Yeah,” I say hoarsely, realizing just how dry my throat is. At the moment I kind of just want to throw myself into the marina and be done with it. But there’s an appointment to keep and my best friend, the woman I’m in love with, the cause of the dull ache now settled in my heart is standing anxiously in front of me, willing my feet to move.

And with unfaltering obedience, they do.

10:59 am