Page 122 of Keeping Score

“You and your girl are dead and buried—” Aiden cut in.

I groaned, taking a long chug of beer. “So not in the mood to recap that right now.”

“No, no, dude. This is a good thing,” Aiden responded, while the rest of the guys nodded their agreement.

I snorted. “I’m failing to see how my life falling apart is a good thing. Every plan for the future I had revolved around that girl being in it.” I gestured toward the door she left from.

“You’re looking at it from the wrong angle.” Matt shook his head. “You have to view it as an opportunity.”

“Just tell him what you mean,” Abbey rolled her eyes.

“We think you should come home,” Tara interjected, beating them all to the punch.

“What?” I nearly choked out a laugh. “I can’t go hang out in Michigan for a week. I have a job.”

“We don’t mean a vacation,” Matt said. “We mean, like, come home.”

“Again, I have a job,” I repeated incredulously.

“Your contract’s almost up,” Tara defended.

“And don’t all you hockey guys retire in your thirties, anyway?”

“Well, yeah, but—”

“So what are you going to do? You don’t have a life here anymore,” Tara said.

“That’s not true,” I argued. Even though, now I guess it kind of was.

I was staying on the couch of my ex-girlfriend’s brother. And yeah, technically he was my best friend, but how would that dynamic change now that Maggie and I were over?

She wouldn’t want her ex-boyfriend lurking in the shadows, and I wouldn’t want to make her uncomfortable by lingering in the background of her life.

I had the hockey team, I guess. But they were all young guys just starting out in their careers, and I was past the point of wanting to spend my free time bar hopping.

Liam already had retirement on his mind, and stubborn bastard he was, it was only a matter of time before he finalized that decision.

And Cassie—sweet, nervous Cassie—would be wracked with guilt trying to navigate maintaining a friendship with her best friend’s ex-boyfriend.

Tara, harsh as she was, was right.

There was nothing left for me in Boston but loneliness and heartbreak and reminders of the life I almost had.

But Michigan? I hadn’t consistently lived there since I was in high school. It was nostalgic. And comfortable. But was it my future?

“What would I even do there?” I asked, wondering if I was insane to even be considering the possibility of going back.

“The same thing you’d do here.” Tara shrugged. “Take some time. Regroup, figure stuff out.”

“Only this time,” Matt said, “you’d be surrounded by your friends.”

“So, what?” I asked, leaning back in my chair. “Is this something all of you have talked about?”

“Pretty much, yeah,” he said as they all nodded their agreement.

“I can’t believe I’m pathetic enough that I needed an intervention.” I rolled my eyes.

I looked to my sister, hoping to find some answer in her eyes directing me toward the right path. Just like that day at the lake when I’d fallen in the frigid water, it seemed like she was here to pull me out of the life I was drowning in.