He wasn’t sure exactly what came over him, but something about the situation made him realize that he wanted Pam Beesly in his life for the rest of his life. He’d always thought that, it seemed, at some level, even before he’d known her—like she was his dream girl, or something silly like that—but it had intensified over the years and now it crashed over him like a wave a thousand miles away from the earthquake that caused its tsunami. He realized later that it was because now, when the thought occurred to him, there was something he could do about it. It wasn’t just a useless desire, a pointless wish in a world full of empty hopes. She was his girlfriend now. They were together.

He could show her that he wanted her in his life forever.

He could buy her a ring.

Of course, he couldn’t give her the ring. Certainly not until they’d figured out what the hell to do about Stamford, and even then probably not like five minutes later. They had to take the right time to wear together, to become not just best friends and in love, but an actual functioning couple. He was looking forward to it, too. These weren’t just moments to jump over and skip. He was actively eager to get to just be in a relationship with Pam, so it wasn’t like he was going to try to rush her into another engagement immediately (and God knew that he couldn’t ask her to marry him without a definite plan of when that would happen: the last guy to do that had fucked everything up royally). No, he and she needed time to get there, and then they would get married.

But he could buy her a ring now, because that made it more real for him, made it something that he could fall back on in his own mind while thinking about their future. Something that would remind him how serious this all was, as if he needed reminding.

So he walked into the Swarovski store—he’d drop by Shavers Shop on his way back to H&M, it wasn’t like he cared what shaving cream he ended up with—and spent a good long time rejecting all the over the top rings the clerk proposed to him. No, that wasn’t Pam. That wasn’t either. He’d know it when he saw it—and then he saw it. Tucked away behind the more expensive, more flashy pieces the clerk wanted him to buy.

If getting Pam was the search for the Holy Grail (as Mark had teased him about a few times), then this was the cup of a carpenter.

Several hundred dollars later (it helped that they were Australian dollars at least), he walked into the Shavers Shop, grabbed the first shaving cream he found that didn’t look ridiculously overpriced, and went to wait for Pam.

**

Pam quickly got over whatever wonder she had that she couldn’t see Jim and enjoyed the H&M thoroughly. It helped that the prices were in Australian dollars, so she could always convert and convince herself it was a very reasonable price in American dollars anyway. She didn’t do what she knew Kelly would have done—MAKEOVER TIME!—but she did end up with a couple tops, a nice pair of capris, and some underclothes that she was very interested in seeing what Jim thought of them—even if she did blush when she thought it.

She was worried she’d taken too long, so it was a relief to see Jim walking out of the Shavers Shop down the way just as she stepped out of H&M. He couldn’t make fun of her for dragging her feet in H&M if he was that slow picking shaving cream, she thought as she waved him down.

“So, they have a good selection over there or what?” she grinned as he leaned down to kiss her (and wasn’t it just lovely to be able to do that?).

“Yeah, I guess so.” He grinned back. “I’m a little disappointed, actually, Pam.”

“What?” What had she done? She thought…but she didn’t know what she thought, because he’d continued speaking.

“I expected to have to carry at least three more bags than this.” He scooped up her shopping and nodded down the mall hallway in the direction back towards Woolworths. “I noticed a bakery down there on the directory—you want to check it out before we have to catch the train?”

“Do I ever?”

Twenty minutes later they caught the train, still munching on a delicious baguette (Pam) and some kind of fancy roll (Jim). It was a long train ride, again, and as soon as Pam had eaten her baguette she let herself fall asleep on Jim. He was comfortable in a way she hadn’t expected; she was used to thinking of him as thin and wiry, compared to Roy, but he obviously had muscles and even fat enough to make a good headrest. And unlike Roy, he didn’t complain.

He never had. She remembered one especially boring conference…which became the very pleasant subject of some quite explicit dreams before she woke up to find the train pulling into Central Station, Jim’s body still under her.

It had been rather the other way ‘round in her head.