Pam was over the moon excited for her outing with Gabby. It wasn’t often she got to go to an art museum in New York City in the middle of the week.

In fact, it was never, not mid-week, not even on the weekends because she never suggested they take the trip.

She knew how it would go if she did, the excuses he’d make, how it was too long a drive or too expensive to park the truck or that looking at paintings was the last thing he wanted to do with his time off, even knowing how much it would mean to her.

And if she never asked him to go with her, she never had to be disappointed when he wouldn’t and that’s why she never made the request.

That made the chance to go with someone whose company she genuinely enjoyed an extra special treat.

Following lunch with Michael the day before, and despite the risk it posed at a time of the day when Aunt Janet would be awake and also so close to when she and Roy could be on the way home, she had him swing by her place to grab some needed things for the excursion into the city. Thanks to Dwight, she had the boots from her go-bag to keep her feet warm, but she decided she’d need something a little nicer to wear for a trip to Manhattan and a heavier, layering sweater she could shed in the museum but would keep her toasty as they walked through the urban streets.

It was a risk she knew, taking a piece of apparel she wore so often but if she could get it back home before the weekend then hopefully her other self wouldn’t even notice it was gone for the time she’d have it.

There was one last thing she wanted to take, another chancy acquisition should the other Pam find time and motivation to draw over the next few days, but having her extra-special, colored pencils with her was a must.

Surely her muse would be stirred after the visit. The beauty of the city would be inspiration enough but on top of it they were headed to the home of the largest collection of art in the whole country. There was no scenario where she wouldn’t want to create some form of expression of her own once back to Scranton.

They got up super early to leave, before even Randall that morning so Gabby wouldn’t be late for her doctor appointment. With city traffic so unpredictable, extra time was needed to offset any gridlocks or bottlenecks that would delay the arrival to where they were headed.

Just the same as when Pam drove in her mother’s car, when they got in the radio was tuned to GEM 104.5, the station that spanned the decades of music from before Pam was born on through the 90s, but nothing from the current century. Gabby began singing along right away with what she recognized as The Four Seasons when their iconic voices came on with the engine.

“Oh, what a night. Why’d it take so long to see the light?”

As the guest, Pam wouldn’t dream of suggesting a station switch, but even if that weren’t the reason, she was more than okay with a change of pace from what was her normal musical preference. The song playing had a kind of familiarity within it, like a memory that could have faded to oblivion if not for a photograph that preserved an image of a moment in time. Her childhood days were filled with these, events only remembered as aligned with the snapshots in the albums back at her parent’s home.

That same feeling of nostalgia washed over her hearing what her mother played so often in her own past, the recollection of her mom’s voice carrying the words to the backseat as she drove her and Penny to school, dance and volleyball practices. Many of the song’s catchier lyrics would became further embossed in her head from their serial rotation of airplay at Gerrity’s and Target.

She knew it so well she could practically sing along, and did, joining Gabby on the next line.

“Seemed so wrong, but now it seems so right.”

Simultaneously Pam and Gabby reached for their seat belts, harmonizing the clicks of the buckles to the beats of the chorus and were soon on their way. Their slightly off-key voices filled the car as they made their way through the neighborhood to the interstate, Gabby echoing every line while Pam hummed along to the lyrics she didn’t know.

Once the song ended, Gabby lowered the radio a touch.

“One of the best parts of a girl’s road trip, the singalongs, right? Although I’m a little surprised you know that one so well.”

For some reason Pam felt funny about telling her it was one of her mom’s favorites. She knew Gabby was around her mother’s age but already on this excursion the gap seemed to not matter. They were just two friends on the way to spend an exciting day in the city. Instead, she just mentioned how it was one of those songs everyone knew. However, the next song that hummed from the speakers she’d never heard before. And as much as she enjoyed a singalong, it required both parties to know the lyrics.

With no new tune to bond over, she asked instead about the exhibit Gabby wanted to see.

“Oh, it’s called Sleeping Eros. I’m a sucker for anything having to do with romance, or cherubs or seraphim for that matter, so I couldn’t let this one go by without seeing it.”

“Oh well it sounds interesting.”

She wasn’t saying it just to agree, art depicting love, she was sure to enjoy, assuming the exhibition would feature more than just sculptures of cupid and other winged representations of the Greek god of romantic love. Surely paintings and sketches of lovers who’d been blessed by his arrow too were to be featured in what they would observe there.

She was likewise expecting they would be able to see more than the one museum gallery in the time they had planned for the visit. With nobody waiting for her at home, they had hours to roam the exhibits and she was excited to view some of her favorite impressionist’s works. Though she often felt she should investigate some of the more avant-garde styles like cubism and surrealism so to expand her own creative sophistication, she couldn’t help her leanings toward Monet and Degas, Pissarro and Sisley. To her, their mastery of expressing the light and movement in a scene via the most delicate swipes of the paintbrush was absolutely fascinating and could sweep her away in reflection.

She herself, felt more confident using richer colors and bolder strokes and often leaned towards the post-impressionistic when she took brush to the canvas. Maybe it was because in her own life she felt so muted, her art was her chance to be a little daring.

But even though she painted with a somewhat heavier hand, it was anything in the style, be it post, neo or the classic defined by Monet, that were the artistic movements she gravitated to on her rare visits to local museums, or during the one time she managed to convince Roy to take in a little culture when they dropped into the Barnes when on a visit to Philly.

“Is there anything special you think you want to see while we are there?”

Pam shifted in her seat as she considered Gabby’s question, thinking today might be the chance to branch out beyond what she already knew.  But when she opened her mouth, what came out was nothing radically different from the first thought that popped in her head after Gabby asked.

“Oh, I haven’t been there in so long, at least not since I was much younger, so I’m happy to get the chance to see anything at all. But if there’s time, I would love to see the galleries with the European paintings, where the Impressionist artists are featured.”

“Time, we’ll have plenty of time. My doctor’s appointment should take no more than a half an hour, then we’ll have all day to take in the art at the museum.”

Gabby turned to flash the briefest smile.

“I will make sure you get to see everything you haven’t yet.”

Pam felt her eyes moisten, unaware why she was suddenly awash with emotion but feeling something strange come over her. She chalked it up to being on her way to a personal utopia she’d been longing to visit for some time. Quickly, she blinked back the wetness forming so not to let her companion see, though what lingered was the smoldering heat that often filled her nose with any intense feelings. The accompanying blush, she hoped Gabby would not notice or find strange if she did.

With her focus back to the road in front of her, Gabby continued, her tone having a hint of the same quality that also embodied the queries posed for the documentary being captured by her husband.

“Would you call yourself an impressionist? I’m no art critique and I’ve only seen your sketches, but is that the style you paint in?”

Though Gabby’s eyes looked straight ahead, Pam couldn’t help but feel seen, the conveyance of genuine interest inherent in the tone of the question.

“Oh no, I paint so rarely and mostly still lifes. Those are more in the style of the post-impressionist movement.”

“Still lifes, like Van Gogh's Sunflowers?”

“Well yeah except I’m no Van Gogh and I tend to paint more office supplies and coffee cups. I do find there’s a lot of beauty in ordinary things.”

But for the unknown song playing softly from the speakers, there was a beat of silence as Gabby seemed to contemplate her words.

“Isn’t that kinda the point…” she finally spoke taking another beat before she added,“…of art, of love, of life?”

Pam’s golden lashes fluttered once more to wash back tears, this time brought on by the way Gabby seemed to see right into her soul, into what it was she loved about being an artist or at least an aspiring one.  Gabby got it and how she expressed it back to Pam had her a little choked up. 

She took a moment to compose herself, not wanting to come across as too emotional before she attempted to speak her agreement but before she could, the melody that was backdrop to their conversation finished playing and the deejay’s charismatic voice came on to announce the next song, another Pam did not recognize.

…This groovy one-hit-wonder soared to number one and spent a half year on the charts. Here’s Alan O’Day’s Undercover Angel…

There must have been something about the track that made the woman sitting beside her go back in time herself, if not in body but in mind. Though the laugh lines around them remained, the eyes they flanked took on the sparkle of woman reliving a sweet memory as the opening bars of the song began to play.

Extruding an essence that no longer made her think of Phyllis, but instead took on another office persona, her voice rose an octave as she squealed in delight chanting, oh my god Pam turn it up, turn it up. Pam swore the spirit of Kelly had taken over her body, she was so animated in her excitement.

Pam did as she was told and raised the volume but didn’t dare speak as her companion belted out every line of the archetypal seventies pop song, the melody sweet and breezy with lyrics that were both strange and beautiful in the story they conveyed.  By the time the chorus played the last time, Pam had garnered enough of the refrain to be able to sing along but still did not join in, as Gabby seemed almost reverent in her vocalizing of each line. The dreamlike look on her face clearly had her in another place as the song echoed.

When it was over, Gabby reached back for the control knobs to lower it to a volume that would allow them to speak again.

“I guess you like that song?”

Gabby, having returned almost to the composed state of the middle-aged woman she was, still wore a Cheshire grin on her face as she explained.

“It was a huge hit in my day. On the night I met Randall, I think it played no less than four times in the car. It always brings me back to the night when we fell in love.”

“It was playing that time, too?”

“Well, they were one and the same, so yeah.”

Pam’s eyes swept over from her own left hand and the small cluster of stones to the radiant sunbeam reflected on the dash from the sparkling solitaire glistening on the ring finger of the driver. Following the ray of light down to Gabby’s hand and then back up to her face she felt a pang of envy that had nothing to do with the size or brilliance of the stone.

Love at first sight. Pam believed in it even though it wasn’t quite how it happened with Roy. Theirs was relationship that took its time to kindle and sometimes she still was in disbelief it did. She never imagined the popular jock could take a liking to the shy, quiet girl she was, but when they were paired in science lab and she helped him get through chemistry, they became first friends and then something more. She didn’t even know she liked him, not until when during a study session he leaned in for an unexpected kiss. Even then, she was more shocked than smitten, but who turned down the star football player when he whispered how much he was into you and so they began dating.

But she’d seen plenty of romantic movies and read enough romance novels to have a sense of what that instant attraction felt like, of how an immediate connection could make you feel. She imagined it would be something a lot like what she felt when she first met Jim–that little dance of delight that she experienced in her belly as he laughed wholeheartedly when she warned him about Dwight. That perhaps but heightened, marked by a desire to run her fingers through his messy hair as she sampled his lips in a kiss, which was what she might have admitted she felt had she not been engaged to Roy at the time.

Gabby and Randall, she supposed had experienced this, an initial spark that stayed ignited through all the years they were together. But did that make it any less romantic than marrying your high school sweetheart, something she would get to do, five months from now? The thought did make her smile again, until Gabby broke into her wedding daydream.

“I must say Pam, I am a little surprised to hear you say you don’t get to the Met that often. It’s not as if it’s so far away that you couldn’t visit every now and again.”

“Oh well, it’s not really Roy’s thing.”

“What going to the city?” she asked innocently.

“Well, that, and going to museums and he’s not all that excited by looking at art.”

She wasn’t sure what made her speak the truth. It was strange, chatting with Gabby was a lot like being in front of the camera in the talking head interviews, it was hard to keep from being anything but completely honest no matter how much she tried to hold back what she was actually thinking.

“Well, that’s surprising, being that his wife-to-be is an artist. “

“I wouldn’t say that,” she contended. “It’s more like a hobby.”

“Either way it’s something you are interested in. You would expect he would show some interest if only because of you?”

She spoke the words sweetly, without any condescension or rancor towards Roy but it still made Pam feel like she had to make excuses for her fiancé.

“What kinds of things does he like? What do you like to do together?”

In her head Pam rattled off a few of his hobbies, drinking, talking sports, watching sports, making her watch sports but she didn’t mention any of these out loud, surprised she was able to keep at least these thoughts to herself.

Pam considered what were their common interests. There weren’t many anymore. She honestly wasn’t quite sure how many there ever were, even back in high school. Back then most of the things they did were things he wanted to, they went to parties and games, hung out with his crowd on the weekends, messed around in his car until curfew. She always thought after high school he’d mature a bit and he would start showing some interest in more of the things she liked such as art, reading, and watching old movies. But to this day these weren’t pastimes they did together or even talked about. If she wanted to discuss a book she’d read or an old movie she saw she usually waited to bring it up with Jim. He either would have read it or seen it or at least asked her what it was that she found interesting if he hadn’t.

But Roy, the last time they discussed the written word was when she helped him study for English in high school.

The things they still did enjoy doing together weren’t exactly the things she wanted to share and she was quite sure Gabby wasn’t asking about their sex life with her question.

But then she remembered the trip they just took. Skiing was more his thing, but she enjoyed it enough when she could keep to her own pace. Or at least she told herself she did. Plus, they had a plenty good time when it was just the two of them at the fireside bar when they finished on the slopes each day.  Over his beers and her apres-ski cocktails they reminisced about their high school ski trips and the crazy things they did back when they were teenagers.

Well, the crazy things Roy did and she watched.

During warmer months, she knew they both liked the beach, for the most part because she could read or sketch while he rode the jet skis with Kenny or the other friends they went with.

These were things she could share with Gabby that were not just what they did in the bedroom.

“Well, we like enjoying the outdoors together. Like we just came back from a ski trip, well actually, we haven’t gone yet, we, the other me and him leave Friday after work. And in the summer, we like to go to the beach a lot.”

“Well, that’s nice. Randall and I like the beach too. I’m not much of a skier though.”

It was quiet again after that for a bit except for the soft sound of the music humming from the speakers. It was another song from her companion’s generation, but one that sounded vaguely familiar, probably something else she heard a little less regularly in the supermarket or the waiting room at her own doctor’s office. She wished it was one she knew better, well enough to revive the aforementioned singalong since the silence was just a bit uncomfortable, in that they left her to her own thoughts.

Pam hoping not to answer anything more about her and Roy, but knowing they still had a long ride ahead decided it was time to ask some questions of her own. She was interested in learning about how she and Randall came to meet, a good love story was always something she enjoyed hearing, but wasn’t sure if she was bold enough to ask about it.

While she was considering whether it would be appropriate to ask, Gabby began to reminisce on her own.

“Me and Randall, now we had a bit of a bumpy start, too.”

Pam was not sure where Gabby had gotten that hers had a bumpy beginning. Earlier in the week during one of their lunchtime chats, she told her all about how they met in high school and started dating despite being from different crowds. Over the meal she shared much of their general history from their school days on through setting the date for their upcoming wedding. But she never gave any indication of any bumps along the way, except maybe the long wait between getting a ring and real plans to follow through on the promise of marriage.

At least, she didn’t think she had. Had she said something to give away the doubts she sometimes had that she and Roy were not quite a match made in heaven. Still, it was good to hear that even romances that seemed to stand the test of time, might not have begun so smooth.

“Really, I thought you said you fell in love from the first moment you met?”

“That’s true, I just didn’t know it. It took a little time to figure it out. It’s a bit of a quirky story.”

The corners of Pam’s mouth tilted up to match what was happening on Gabby’s. Pam loved a quirky story and was eager to hear.

“It starts with Charlie. He was my boyfriend when we met.”

“Wait, you had a boyfriend when you met Randall?”

She nodded.

“Mmhumm. He was the primary reason we didn’t start dating immediately. But of course, he’s also the reason we met. Well, him and Elvis.”

“As in Elvis Presley?”

“That’s right the King. He was it for me at the time. Elvis, not Charlie. I was only dating Charlie a few weeks.”

Pam nodded, a little confused but intrigued nonetheless. She also couldn’t help but think about someone else who had a bit of an Elvis obsession, maybe not so much the way Gabby did, but enjoyed doing an impression of him quite often, and had just the other day when they were buying new coats.

“Now I know it’s a little strange, my generation wasn’t exactly still all gaga for him, Elvis, but I’ve always been a little late to the scene.”

Michael too, Pam thought, as she suddenly had a better understanding of why he too loved Elvis, or at least loved talking like him.

“I was still a huge fan, you might even say a little too fanatical. But it was in a roundabout way, my obsession with him that sent me Randall. Oh, and also got me my very impractical couch.”

“Now this I want to hear. I’ve gotta say I’ve been wondering about that couch, not that I would ever have asked about it, but since you brought it up.”

Gabby didn’t begin her tale with the story of the white sofa.  She started by sharing more about her love for Elvis.

“While my friends were listening to the Beatles and the Stones and Zeppelin, I was still listening mostly to Elvis. When they moved on to Elton John and Queen and ELO, I still fixated on Elvis. I didn’t let myself accept there were other sounds out there I might like, accept the possibility that I could like any other music as much as his. Since his was the music I first loved I thought nothing else could ever be as good or bring me as much joy.”

“So, you only listened to Elvis?” Pam asked curiously. She couldn’t imagine listening to only one singer or group and nothing else although sometimes it felt like she did, as a never-ending cycle of Springsteen CDs played on rotation in Roy’s truck, even though he knew The Boss wasn’t her favorite.

“Not quite, I was still a regular teenager who went out and went to parties and drove in cars. Back then we didn’t have CD players or those iPod things so we could only listen to what came on the radio or what we played on our vinyl records at home.

Pam didn’t have an iPod she had a Prism DuroSport. She almost had an iPod but she gave it up for a teapot. A teapot that came with a mixed tape. It was one hundred percent the right choice.

Music was one of the special things she and Jim shared. Or that Jim shared with her. Her knowledge of new music was pretty much limited to what she heard on the local pop station in the rare times she got to choose the station in the truck or at their home. It was mostly thanks to Jim’s suggestions she ever branched out beyond Kelly Clarkson and Maroon 5. 

When Roy bought her the DuroSport for Christmas, she went right to the cassette Jim gave her, knowing the mix he made would be a perfect combination of old songs he knew she liked and new sounds he thought she might enjoy. Every song had eventually made it to the playlist on her Duosport, coincidentally thanks to Dwight who clued her in to the Russian website where she could purchase them all for cheap. But, even though Roy and Dwight were mostly to thank for her MP3 player filled with music, it was Jim she thought of whenever she played it and it was Jim she was still thinking of even as she stared off at the sign for Mount Pocono, where she had just gone/would go skiing with her fiancé in a few days.

Suddenly feeling a wave of guilt for her thoughts, she turned back to Gabby who was still chatting about the music of her time, Elvis, and her boyfriend, Charlie, unaware Pam’s mind had wandered off slightly.

“So, when I heard the devastating news Elvis had died, I told Charlie I wanted to go to Graceland to pay my respects and asked him to come with me.”

Pam turned her head back from the sign they rolled past to look at Gabby again, wide-eyed and with a curious smile overtaking her face.

“Okay, wow when you say you were obsessed, you meant it.”

“Well, I was, but it was also the seventies. My generation could be a little wacky like that. We thought nothing of taking off to another state to catch a concert or pay our respects in vigil after the King’s death.”

“So, did he? Did he go with you?”

“Charlie, no. He told me not to either and we kind of had a big fight about it. But I was going. Nobody was going to tell me what I could or couldn’t do.”

Pam was impressed. At age 26 she still didn’t have the backbone to stand up for the things she wanted. Case in point, her first trip to the Met since she’d gone with her mom ages ago was years later when the cameraman’s wife invited her along during her fantastical time travel experience. Young Gabby it seems would have insisted they go or simply had gone alone. She quickly learned it was just what she did when she wanted to go to Memphis to leave a memento outside her idol’s famous home.”

“Wow,” was all she could think of to say at first. After a beat of silence, she asked.

“Did you break up because of it?”

“No, but it still put a small dent in our relationship. It being so new, a fight over my choices wasn’t a good way to start.”

She paused as if waiting for her to respond with a comment, but then gently shook her head and murmured something Pam couldn’t quite make out but sounded a bit like didn’t happen yet Gabrielle.

“The week before I left was tense but he still drove me to the airport and before I head into the terminal he told me he was sorry, that he’d been inconsiderate of my feelings. He said he wanted to make it up to me and he would be there the to pick me up when I flew back.”

I wonder what that’s like, hearing I'm sorry.

Pam was used to half-asked apologies, tickles instead of contrition and sometimes got nothing at all, only time’s passage putting an end to their fights. She thought this Charlie sounded sweet and was surprised to know something ultimately broke them up. She was about to find out what, or rather who, but first Gabby gave her a glimpse of history, sharing what it was like to be in Memphis in the week following the untimely death of the man who changed music.

The way she told it, with a documentary style narrative, gave her another clue as to why she and Randall were a good fit, plus made the long trip seem to fly by faster. Before she knew it, they were well into New Jersey. 

“So, like I said, Charlie was supposed to pick me up at the airport, but he had this crazy, unpredictable boss that was always keeping him late, you know the type…” she added sardonically.

“Me, no. My boss is a saint. He is respectful and mature and very considerate of my time. He even granted me two extra weeks of vacation time… of course in another dimension, with no money, means of transportation or if it weren’t for you and Randall, without a place to stay.”

Sometimes she was still in her own disbelief that this was truly happening and more shocked that her new friend believed she was a time traveler and not just completely mental. But what a relief it was to have someone else besides Michael to spend this time with, someone who seemed to understand the strangeness of the situation and who by bringing her along today was making her experience as enlightening as it had been difficult. 

“I told you it’s no trouble. It’s nice to have a new friend. I’ll be sorry when you go back to your time.”

Pam had to wonder why that should make a difference. Now that they’d met, they could remain friends even after next week when she was back to herself. Pam could only suppose Gabby was concerned once she didn’t need to, she wouldn’t want to spend time with a woman from her mother’s generation, but it was quite the opposite. She felt more at ease with Gabby than she did with the girlfriends of Roy’s buddies, who were her own age. She could talk a little easier with Gabby, than with Angela or Kelly who were also closer to her peer group. Isabel, her closest girlfriend, didn’t want to go to art museums with her or sit around and talk about old movies. She wanted to go out dancing and gossip about the gang they knew from college. And while Pam enjoyed that too, she had other interests that her new friend seemed to share. Gabby, while never going to be her best friend, that would be a little weird and besides that was and always would be Jim, could still continue to be a welcome part of her life.

Pam was about to reassure her of this, but before she could Gabby was back onto her tale.

“…so of course, that night he was detained when my flight was due. We had no cell phones back then; he had no way to let me know he wouldn’t be able to get me.”

“Uh-oh. What happened?”

“I’ve got to say Charlie truly was a good guy when it came down to it. It turns out he wasn’t the guy for me but not because he didn’t treat me right.”

Again, a pause from Gabby was met with Pam’s silence. So, she went on.

“Stuck at work and unable to get word to me, he arranged for his roommate to come pick me up from my flight so I wouldn’t be stranded.”

“Randall!” Pam exclaimed.

“Randall,” her companion confirmed.

“I had only seen him for a blip the night Charlie came over to me at the bar to ask my number. The few nights I was at his place we were, umm, getting better acquainted when his roommate came home and snuck past us on the couch and right into his room. So naturally, I didn’t quite recognize him.”

Pam wondered a bit what young Randall might have looked like, before his hair turned salt and pepper gray and perhaps before he donned a mustache and tufted beard. His eyes which still glowed with a jewel-bright blue, must have been striking on a younger man’s face.

“So, I stood outside the terminal watching for Charlie’s car to pull up all the while observing this vaguely familiar guy waiting in his old Chrysler, very animatedly crooning the song playing so loud I could hear it through his open window as I walked back and forth past him. All the while I was unaware that he was there for me.”

“It was that song, wasn’t it? The one we just heard.”

“Yup,” she nodded. “Undercover Angel.”

Something in the way she spoke the song’s title, in whispered reverence, led Pam to think again of the song Jim played for her on his iPod on the night they swayed together in front of the Dunder Mifflin building. She could barely make sense of what the lyrics meant and couldn’t name a single other song by the group, but it didn’t matter, whenever she heard it following that night, and it was often since he put it on her Christmas teapot mixed tape, it always made her smile thinking of the fun they had that evening.

Gabby too, wore a dreamy grin as she thought of the song that had that same effect on her. Even in profile Pam could see a physical transformation had taken place on her face as she began to talk about her husband. There was a resplendence that shone in her eyes and a luminosity that brightened her whole visage.

It was a look she knew was familiar, a facial quality she’d seen on someone else, somewhere else, quite recently in fact, only she couldn’t place whose face it was that she’d seen that same glow of love, probably on television, the character or show, she couldn’t think of in the moment, especially with her time jump still messing with her memories.

Gabby seemed almost trance-like as she retold what happened next, describing how watching him singing brought the first genuine smile to her face, perhaps since she touched down the day prior in Memphis. And how when he turned to see her eyeing him curiously, he slowly turned the color of a beet.

She relinquished the rest of the story with such detail, Pam felt almost as if she were intruding on a first date between two soulmates, even though Gabby wouldn’t have called it that at the time, since she was dating the man who sent him out to pick her up.

On their way home ...a quiet ride at first until the angel song came on again on another station and she teased him about his energetic warbling but then found out how fun it was when he suggested she sing along with him...they got swept up in a deep conversation and connected in a way she had yet to with her new boyfriend. Talking about everything from music to growing up in Austin, Texas, her, and Cincinnati, Ohio, him and how they both came to be in New York, and they were soon at her Bayside apartment.

As tired as she was after the tearful day she had, she couldn’t seem to leave the car. They kept right on talking, laughing and singing together both to the frequent Elvis songs being played on the radio in tribute and the little diddy that had been her introduction to him, and that came on again no less than two more times while they went on chatting for hours. When they finally said goodbye, they both knew it was the last time they would talk like that since the next reason they would have to be together would be when she was back in the company of her boyfriend, his roommate.

As clear as it seemed to Pam from the story who Gabby was meant to be with, she also understood why she didn’t act immediately upon what she felt that night. It was a tough thing to do, breakup with someone you liked a lot, even if you thought maybe there was someone else who could make you happier. It was something she dwelt on once or twice herself, always coming back to her history and comfort with her long-time partner and fear of rocking the boat.

Hearing Gabby’s resonant voice speak again drew her from her own thoughts and back into their story.

“Over the next six months, we saw a lot of each other when I would spend nights at their place, the three of us smushed together on the little couch in their cozy living room watching Laverne & Shirley and Charlie’s Angels. Occasionally, I tried to set him up with some of my girlfriends for double dates but he never seemed very interested. Of course, I never caught on to why. At least not until the week Charlie had this big assignment at work that kept him late every night that week.”

The radio began to crackle and fade as the car started into the Lincoln Tunnel. Pam had been so rapt by the story she hadn’t even noticed they’d come that far, gone through the toll booth and were on their way into the underground passage.

“Things hadn’t much progressed with Charlie, and I think both of us were a little unsure how much we really were right for each other but neither of us wanted to admit it, which made us both try a little harder to make each other fit in one another’s lives. That week for instance, I stayed over every night at his place since there was little other time we could spend together, though sometimes he didn’t even walk through the door until I had gone to sleep. Randall, however, was between assignments and was home every night and so it was me and him who enjoyed each other’s company through the week, domestically making dinner, watching TV and continuing what we started on the car ride home.”

Traffic slowed in the tunnel, which was just as well, since Pam figured once through to the other side, navigating the city streets would take top priority and with the story still unfinished, she didn’t mind the extra time Gabby now had to complete it.

“The weekend finally came and Charlie and I spent most of Saturday locked away in his room, making up for the time missed over the week. But all the while, as I lay with Charlie, I imagined being on the other side of the wall, in the other bed, staring into the crystalline eyes of the man I had been slowly falling for all week, and if I were honest with myself, who had long since replaced his roommate’s place in my heart when it was him who showed up at the airport on Charlie’s bequest. But with no sign from Randall that I was anything more to him than a friend, I continued through the motions with Charlie, hoping that what I felt for his roommate would shift back to the man I was dating.”

Deep down Pam knew the feeling she spoke of. She hadn’t even admitted it to herself before this very moment but she could no longer deny there were nights when she closed her eyes she imagined a different man beside her, one who not so long before, on a very rocky boat trip revealed he did feel something stronger for her than friendship. But he didn’t tell her. He told Michael, and besides she was already in too deep. The man in her bed wasn’t her boyfriend of six months, it was her fiancé of three years, the same guy she’d dated for over six years before that and the only one she ever had a romantic connection to.

Before she could think any more about the parallels of their stories, Gabby continued with hers.

“Saturday night was a poker night with the boys they had planned for a while. I was going to head home but Charlie asked me to stay. He promised to beg out of the game early and we could go for late night snacks at the diner. While the game was in full swing in the living room, I worked on my lesson plans at the kitchen table. Randall came in to grab some cold beers and that was it. He made some joke that got me laughing but then his face froze and his sapphire eyes bore into mine with a gaze so piercing I felt I might shatter and disintegrate in fragments onto the linoleum floor. When after what felt like eternity he spoke, I swear I could feel the pen I was holding melting in my grip from the heat building up in my body.”

It wasn’t her life or her history but Pam felt the pressure of the situation as if it were her own and began to twist her ring in the same way she had so often before in her own most emotional times.

“I don’t know what gave him the courage with Charlie and the gang right there in the other room, but he blurted out how he felt about me, how he’d been feeling ever since that night he picked me up at the airport.”

“Oh my god, then what happened?”

“Well things got a little ugly when Charlie came into the kitchen to see what was taking so long getting the brews and found his roommate kissing his girlfriend and me kissing him right back.”

They were out of the tunnel and as suspected, Gabby focused her attention on the delicate art of driving in the city. Pam stayed silent to let her concentrate on the drive, herself lost in the imagination of what may have transpired in the aftermath of that night. Once Gabby navigated to 10th Avenue, she picked up her tale once more.

“A few days later Randall moved out of their shared apartment and in with me. Eight months later we were having our first dance as man and wife to Can't Help Falling in Love and six months after that Elissa was on the way.

“Elissa after Elvis?”

“That’s right. Elissa Charlotte. Charlie never spoke to either of us again but we honored him anyway. After all, without either one of them, Elvis or Charlie, we might never have fallen in love.”