If Ryan is honest with himself, he always knew it was a mistake, even the moment he was making it.

There was a time when he didn’t know who Kelly was: when she was just the quiet, nice-assed Indian girl in consumer relations. When Kelly is nervous, she’s surprisingly quiet; he thinks with longing of a day when Kelly didn’t feel she knew him well enough to fill him in on her every tiny thought. She was shy around him, and maybe the cameras, too, and so he didn’t know who she really was.

By the time they had been at the bar for half an hour, he knew. Out in the world on a date, Kelly was relaxed and happy. And so, chatty. An hour of listening to petty problems, makeup, and some guy from 10 Things I Hate About You playing a courageous gay cowboy later, he was pretty ready to never hear another word, ever. Especially about Jennifer Anniston.

He found himself just staring at her, amazed that she could read him so badly. She thinks he cares about Paris Hilton. Is that what he seems like? A guy who would care about Paris Hilton?

This seems to happen to him a lot. Not with Paris Hilton, but with other things. He doesn’t know what people see in him, but he’s pretty sure it’s not there. Sometimes he would like it to be, like when his advisor told him he thought he had a future in business. Other times, like when Michel decides he’s the kind of guy who wants to be his “Apprentice”, all he knows to do is stay quiet and hope they keep seeing it. He certainly doesn’t.

He realizes he’s stayed vacant a little too long, because Kelly isn’t talking. She squirms in her seat like a little kid, and then starts off again, though not about Tom Cruise anymore.

“Omigod Ryan, I am such a spaz going on and on about this stuff. I mean, you probably don’t care about scientology, because I mean, sometimes *I* don’t even care about scientology, and I like Katie Holmes a lot. And you’re so smart, you probably spend all your time thinking about business and math and your goals, while I’m all sitting here wondering if my eye-shadow is too bright. I just know you have, like, this idea in your head of who you’re going to be and how successful you’ll be. You just know exactly what you want…”

And that’s when Ryan kisses her. It’s not true, and it’s less true every second he kisses her. So he knows it’s a mistake as she practically yells “Ryan! What took you so long?!” He knows it’s a bigger one when he drives her home, and they make out in his Civic in front of her apartment. But he doesn’t know quite how big until the next morning, when he tears the 13th off the calendar and finds himself staring at the little pink hearts.

Valentine’s Day. Of course.