She's practiced saying it in the mirror. She knows what her mouth looks like as they form the words. She knows how they roll off her tongue, and she knows the way that the words form on her mouth and melt right before she says them.

"I love you, Jim."

Pam has said it in her head a million times, and out loud to herself a million more. On the rare occasions that she drives herself to work, she practices in the car. She knows that she needs to be the first to say it now. Jim poured so much into saying it before, so much hope and anxiety, only to have her say she couldn't. She knows that she has to make it up to him still, and she knows that this is how she can. Pam can still see his face as she tells him that she's still going to marry Roy, that Jim must have misinterpreted things, even as her heart was beating and her head was spinning, liar, liar, liar.

She wants it to be perfect. She wants to tell him in the most romantic, perfect way she can think of, so that the memory of those words are not "I can't" but lovely, sweet, and round, "I love you Jim." So far she had not come up with a way that seems good enough, and she's dying to try out the words in real life. She's dying to see his face as they slip off her tongue.

It is Jim, who ironically, gives her the idea and the opportunity. He suggests taking a trip, a weekend away that is not spent at Dwight's beet farm with Dwight smashing beets and his creepy cousin Mose staring at the two of them in a way that makes Jim tighten his arms around Pam, and Pam insist they push the beds together that night. Not that Jim complained about that part of it. But the creepy Mose part, and the outhouse, and Dwight's moaning, all combined to make it an interesting night away, but hardly romantic. Jim wants to make it up to Pam by taking her somewhere great, romantic. Somewhere that Roy wouldn't have thought to take her.

Pam thinks sometimes that Jim wastes too much time and energy trying to be better than Roy. He is better than Roy, and she wishes that she could explain that to him. But Jim is stubborn in his own way, and no matter how many times Pam tries to tell him that it's the little things that he does that make him above and beyond Roy, Jim still has this foolish need to one-up her ex-fiancé.

Jim surprises her with a hotel in New York City, and tickets to a play that she was dying to see, and they plan to go in a couple of weeks. Pam decides that it is in New York that she will tell Jim that she loves him.

They go to the modern art museum their first afternoon there, after they've dropped their bags off at the hotel. Jim holds her hand as she excitedly explains that this is a Pollack, or this is a Warhol. He listens and nods as she talks about how she's always wanted to go to the Warhol museum in Pittsburgh, and he tells her maybe they can go soon, drive across the state and stay with some of his friends who live just outside of Pittsburgh. She beams at him, and she thinks about saying it there. Right there, in front of a Picasso, with their fingers intertwined, and the words are on her lips, but Jim spots a sculpture that he's read about, and he's pulling her along and asking her questions like she's some sort of expert, and she is amazed and pleased by how she can answer most of his questions.

She almost says it again that night, as they get ready in their hotel for the show. She needs help putting her necklace on, and he lifts up the hair that she had painstakingly straightened, and he starts kissing her neck, and she giggles and reprimands him that they are going to be late if they don't hurry up, and Jim smirks at her.

"Seriously," Pam says turning and placing her hands on his chest. "If we miss the first act, you will be in so much trouble." And after some threatening, and a few more kisses, the two manage to get out the door and Jim hails a cab for her and slips in beside her, placing his hand on her knee, and she holds on to the door handle as the cab whips through green lights and around corners. She almost says it then, but the cab driver is yelling at some man crossing the street, and it doesn't seem like the right time.

Jim suggests going to get a bite to eat after the show ends, and she thinks about the last time he was up here. He was with Karen, interviewing for a job he ultimately gave up for her. She has no doubt in her mind that he was offered the job and turned it down. When she asked him about it, he had shrugged it off.

"I didn't get it," he said. "But I got something better." He grinned at her then, and she felt it all the way through her body and into the tips of her fingers and toes until she thought she was going to burst with absolute happiness.

They are sharing a slice of cheesecake and both are sipping at cups of decaf coffee, laughing about a line in the play when Pam thinks about opening her mouth and saying the words, but before she can, she hears a voice behind them.

"Jim? Pam?" They turn to find Ryan standing, a blonde girl on his arm, his whole look and attitude a little too obvious, a little too desperate.

"Ryan," Jim nods at Ryan, who takes that as an invitation to sit down. Jim slips over to the other side of the booth next to Pam, and Ryan and the too tall blonde girl sit in Jim's vacated seat.

"Pearl, this is Jim and Pam, they worked with me in Pennsylvania," Ryan introduces. "Pearl is a model." Pam feels self conscious suddenly, and Jim places his arm behind her, his hand casually toying with her hair.

"Nice to meet you," Pam says politely, and Pearl just nods, looking around the small café, mildly bored.

"What are you guys doing up here?" Ryan asks.

"Oh, we came up for the weekend," Jim explains. "Saw a show, went to some museums." He shrugs, and Pam feels his fingers on her neck, and she wants to tell him now, and she thinks if she opens her mouth "I love you" will tumble out.

"That's nice," Ryan says, but it's in a condescending voice. "We're about to hit a party. Pearl is friends with the bouncer at this new club called Touch, and it's the Olsen twins' birthday. There's supposed to be crazy paparazzi and all these celebrities. It'll be crazy."

"That sounds fun," Pam lies, and she thinks about how Ryan used to be nice. Pam always felt a little bad for him, when it was obvious he was unhappy at Dunder Mifflin, unhappy with Kelly and the twisted relationship they had going on, and she could semi-relate to him. About how life seemed to get away from you until you weren't sure how you ended up where you did, and how frustrating it could be when you knew that this wasn't what you had planned for yourself, but you weren't sure how to change it. Jim's hand dropped from her neck onto her shoulder, and she leans in closer to him.

She doesn't think that Ryan seems any happier here in this fancy new life than he had in Scranton.

"You should come," Ryan suggests. Pam and Jim share a look, and it's Jim that
shakes his head slightly.

"No thanks, man," he says. "We're just going to head back to the hotel I think. We're pretty beat from all the things we did today." Ryan shrugs, but it's obvious that he's disappointed that they won't come, and Pam thinks about going for just a second, just to make Ryan a little happier.

"Your loss," Ryan says, and he grabs Pearl's hand, and drags her to her feet. "Good to see you." He pulls his blonde model out the door.

"Well," Jim says. He tilts his head to side. "Pearl seemed nice. Talkative, but nice." And Pam giggles, and though her feet hurt, and she's exhausted, she can't remember being this happy in a long time.

"Let's go back to the hotel," she says, and Jim is more than happy to oblige. She almost says it then, as they walk hand in hand back to catch a cab, as her head rests on his shoulder during the short ride back to the hotel.

Instead, it slips out as they are lying in bed together that night. Jim is watching some terrible movie, his arm wrapped around her as she lies on top of him. She's half asleep when he leans over to turn out the light, and it just slips out.

"I love you," she says softly and sleepily. Jim's eyes widen and it takes her fuzzy mind a minute to remember what she just said.

"Huh," is what Jim says. And Pam is shaking the sleep from it's hold on her brain, rubbing her eyes and trying to figure out how to fix this.

Pam wakes up a little more. "Oh crap, I wanted it to be this grand gesture. I've been waiting for weeks for the perfect time to say it." She sighs, and Jim tightens his hold on her. "I wanted it to be perfect."

"It's perfect," he says, his voice tight. "I love you too." And Pam grins, burying her face in his t-shirt, smelling his cologne and the hotel soap, and she thinks about how her mouth must have moved when she said it. How the words felt as they came out. And she thinks she'll say it again.

"I love you," she whispers. "I love you, I love you, I love you."