Anything

They’d spent weeks talking about it, then not talking. Then talking in circles some more. Pam knew Jim was right - there’d never be a perfect time. It would always be a leap of faith. Whenever.

‘I guess at some point, you just have to say, damn the torpedoes,’ she sighed.

‘Wow. How romantic is that?’ he replied, sounding less bemused than he probably intended. ‘Kind of like making a baby with General Patton.’

Regardless of how positively the discussion began, inevitably everything she’d never done would swirl through the air between them. She’d never finished school; never driven a convertible; never learned to use a potter’s wheel. She’d never been to Paris.

‘And, I never want to be that guy, Pam,’ he’d apologize, retreating into the fog of compromises he couldn’t ask her to make.

She was aware she was turning him into a pretzel, making him feel ashamed of his selfishness for saying he wanted it, guilty of insufficient enthusiasm for saying he could wait. When he signed up for the journalism class he’d been dancing around for months, she was relieved. Not only was he - at last - giving it a try, she took it as a sign that he wasn’t ready for the singular focus she feared a baby would require either.

Still, the truth remained obvious: he practically seemed like a child himself whenever the subject of a baby was broached. He’d say anything is possible, you can do anything, we can make anything work, I’ll do anything you need. Anything. He’d hold her hand and run his thumb over her palm, as if his optimism might quite literally rub off on her. Sometimes, when she closed her eyes and tuned out everything but his voice, it did.

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

Finally, it came down to impulse. One morning, she’d simply flung the half-empty plastic disc into the bathroom garbage. She’d almost laughed out loud, realizing that piece of pink plastic nestled in the trash amongst the discarded toothpaste boxes and used Q-tips was all that stood between her and the rest of her life. More than heartfelt vows and drunken relatives’ awkward toasts; more than the simple matching gold bands they both wore.

This would make them irrevocable. And that was the one thing she was sure she wanted. Without condition, without looking back. The alternative was unbearable.

That evening – once it had sunk in - she told him what she’d done. She carefully explained that these things don’t usually happen instantaneously; it could still take weeks, months even.  As if he were the one needing reassurance. He nodded, doing his best impression of someone nonchalant, but his uncontainable smile blew his cover. For a moment, the way his eyes went soft and watery made her forget all her reasons why not.

It didn’t happen that first night.

‘Here goes nothing,’ he’d laughed nervously between kisses, as she’d fumbled, shaky-handed, to undo his belt buckle.

It undoubtedly could have been that time; but somehow, she knew it wasn’t.  She was certain, however, two days later. On a morning like so many others, half-awake, his familiar warm solidity above her in the still dark room, moving achingly sweet and slow. He moaned that sleepy way he did then, his mouth pressed into her neck, and that was it. She’d felt the pulsing flood of it, deep inside her. She’d known.

She whispered in his ear right then (because a moment like that should be marked): love you. I love you. I love you. His reply was just her own murmured name, and that marked it too. She’d clung to him and they’d stayed locked together for a very long time, even for them, past the ringing alarm, until the room was filled with light.

They’d been late for work that day.

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

Barely two weeks later, she came out of the bathroom with another piece of portentous plastic in her hand. Putting the newspaper down on the coffee table, he calmly stood and gathered her to him, resting his head on top of hers. He simply sighed okay into her hair.

Her face still flush against his chest, she’d asked if he wasn’t surprised by how quickly it had all happened.

‘Nah, it was bound to happen sooner than later…what with all the dirty military talk and…’

‘Seriously, you’re not scared?’ she pulled back enough to look up at his face, not wanting him to deflect.

‘Fuck yeah, I am,’ he’d admitted. Pausing, as if measuring his words, he continued, ‘I’m just more happy than scared.’

‘You can tell me, you know.  If you’re freaking out,’ she pressed. ‘I mean, this is like diving head first into the deep end.’

‘Hey…Danger’s my middle name,’ he kissed her forehead and sunk back down to the sofa, taking her with him.

‘In fact,’ he added, ‘let’s put that on the list of baby names. James Danger Halpert.’

‘James Danger Halpert…Jr,’ she concluded.

He laughed as she curled into his lap, and it sounded like relief. He felt like an island beneath her, the current breaking all around them.

She’d never been to Paris. She’d never done so many things.