Page 107 of Keeping Score

There she went again, with that sad look in her eyes. Somehow, I didn’t think it was entirely about me.

“Don’t you remember our pact?” she said suddenly, stopping mid-sidewalk.

Traffic blurred past us, people passed by—a comfort making me feel a little less alone in the moment.

“Our pact?” I repeated slowly, while she looked at me expectantly. “What do you—”

Shit, I thought, when it finally clicked.

That joke we had made when we were sixteen. If neither of us were married by thirty, we’d just marry each other.

“Abbey, we were kids when we made that,” I told her. “That was back when we thought thirty was old as hell.”

“Doesn’t it feel like it sometimes?” she asked quietly, voice barely audible against the sound of traffic around us. “Like life is just passing by too quickly to catch up with?”

“Sometimes,” I admitted, thinking of how it felt like yesterday I was a fresh-faced rookie in the first year of his career and today I was at an age where people had started asking me about my retirement plans.

“It does for me,” she said, walking under a streetlamp. “It feels like everyone we know is married, with kids and houses and… I have—”

“A cat and an overdraft checking account?” I offered with a smirk.

She let out a laugh, breaking through the barrier of melancholy she’d cloaked herself in.

“Low blow, Callahan.” She punched my shoulder lightly. “But glad to see you still know me. That’s a comfort.”

It was, I realized. A comfort. To have someone who had known you for that long. Who had seen you in every phase of life and had stayed through them all.

“I know what you mean, though.” I thought of Liam and Cassie. And all my old friends who had started to settle down and start real life. It was hard not to feel left behind in comparison. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot, too. It seems like everyone else is hitting all these milestones and I’m struggling to catch up.”

“Tara told me what happened,” Abbey said. “With your ex.”

“Don’t call her that,” I said, flinching.

“Why?”

“Just feels wrong.”

Abbey shrugged. “Well, for what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I never would’ve done that to you.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I didn’t say anything. We just meandered the streets of Boston in a comfortable silence. I didn’t have to try to figure out what she was thinking or worry about how she was feeling.

It was nice. Almost as if I could turn my brain off for a little while in the companionship of a friend.

When we reached the lobby of her hotel, I was almost sad that the night had come to an end. Sad to have to go back to Liam’s guest room and face the reality of my situation.

Sad that nothing had worked out the way I’d planned.

“Goodnight,” I told her. “Thanks for coming. It means a lot.”

“No problem.” She shrugged. “I needed to get away for a little bit, anyway.”

I nodded, understanding.

I wondered what my life would’ve been like if I stayed back in Michigan instead of coming here. I probably would’ve gotten a job where my dad worked.

And if I were being honest, I probably would’ve been married to Abbey now.

As if reading my thoughts, she started to speak, a little uneasily.