Page 125 of Keeping Score

“Yeah,” Brody said, sparing a quick glance at me. “Will do.”

“It was nice to meet you guys,” I said, even though I had the oddest sensation of jealousy toward them that I couldn’t explain.

I guess if I tried, it would be simplified down to one thing: when you’re dating someone, you’re the most important person in their life. But once you break up, you’re out of it, as if you never existed at all.

But his friends? They would be able to talk to him, see him, hear him laugh long after I was a blip in his memories.

I even resented them for the conversations I was sure he’d have about me someday. I’d probably go down in their group lore as the stupid girl who let Brody get away.

Not that I didn’t deserve it.

“Yeah, you too,” Aiden called out, and I wasn’t sure if I was imagining the judgment radiating off his gaze. Sean offered a nod and a wave, and then we watched their car disappear down Liam and Cassie’s driveway.

“That was fun,” I said, trying to break the ice as Brody and I made our way into the foyer. “Thanks for bringing me.”

“Fun?” He raised his brows. “You mean the part where they interrogated you at lunch, or the Family Guy impressions over dessert?”

“They weren’t interrogating me,” I huffed out a laugh. “They’re just… protective of you. It’s nice to see.”

“Yeah,” he mused. “I guess they are. But I’m sorry if it made you uncomfortable.”

“It didn’t,” I told him.

The only thing that made me uncomfortable was the truth I had to admit out loud about our relationship, but that wasn’t anyone’s fault but my own.

“Well, good.” He said, and we lingered in the silence for a few moments. Brody looked as if he wanted to disappear, and I was so worried that if I let him walk away, we might lose any chance at repairing the damage.

If nothing else, I at least wanted to bridge the gap between us a little. Show him he could talk to me like a normal person, despite the erratic behavior I’d been displaying of late.

“Well, I should—” He pointed a thumb upstairs, and I just knew he was going to say something about getting his stuff and leaving, and I couldn’t bear for it to be all the way over yet.

“It is weird though,” I said, cutting him off.

“What is?”

“That you had this whole other life before you came here. Before we ever met.”

“Well, yeah, Mags.” He let out a chuckle. “Isn’t that true for most people?”

“I guess,” I shrugged. “But you’re so immersed in every part of my world. You’ve been to my childhood home, you know my family, you’ve met everyone I’ve ever cared about. I don’t know, it just feels like—well, it just feels like I’ve known you my entire life.”

And somehow it still feels like I’ll know him for the rest of it, too.

“Yeah,” he exhaled a breath. “Yeah, I know what you mean.”

“You do?”

“Yeah.” He nodded. “I mean, you’ve never walked through the halls of my high school, or maybe you haven’t met the guys I used to hang out with growing up before today, but—you know the story behind every scar on my body. You know how I cried like hell when my aunt died and the only thing that made me feel better was watching Golden Girls reruns. And you know about how I had to drive myself to the ER after I split my head open playing hockey because I was too worried my mom would pass out at the sight of the blood I was covered in.”

I was still, listening to him. To these stories I’d memorized until they’d become part of my own. Brody was ingrained in my very DNA and I didn’t know how I was supposed to part with him. How was I supposed to spend a Christmas without remembering the time he was eight and caught his dad dressing up as Santa and he ruined it for his siblings by waking them up to tell them all? How could I pass an Italian bakery without thinking about the little cannolis he loved so much? How could I do anything without the memory of him lingering over me for the rest of my life?

I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. I didn’t want to.

“You might not have been there for any of my earliest core memories, Mags,” he said, staring me dead in the eye. “But it feels like you might as well have been.”

Oh, Brody. I thought with a pang to my heart, not knowing how I could miss someone so desperately who was standing right in front of me.

I know I broke everything, but I’m going to fix it. I swear.