“RAIN, HAIL OR SHINE” seemed like a good idea when Paul and I decided on this workout regime in the summer, but this morning it’s sleeting a little, and Abby must be starting to rub off on me because it feels too fucking cold to be outside. I’m not going to be the one to back out from the challenge, though, and when Paul seems unfazed, I fall into step beside him alongside the river.
“This is stupid,” he says after about a mile. The ground is icy, and we’ve both almost slipped a few times despite the salt on the pavement. It doesn’t help that I’m distracted—I’m thinking about my next move with Abby, since we’re supposed to have sex again tomorrow. Paul knocks the pace right back to walking and mutters, “Maybe we should stick to the treadmills when ice is falling from the sky.”
“Agreed.”
Now that we’re not running, we quickly catch our breath, and the silence feels odd. Paul glances at me.
“How’s things with Abby?” he asks.
“Going well actually,” I say. “Do I ask you how you’re doing?”
“We had mediation last week. I think I’m just going to give her the fucking vacation home. It’s getting too ugly. I don’t understand—she was never like this when we were married.”
I wince. Paul sounds utterly bewildered. It’s not a look he wears often.
“Sorry, Paul.”
“Yeah,” he sighs. “Me, too. So you and Abby—I know there’s the baby thing, but do you think you’re going to try to make it work? As a couple, I mean.”
“Well,” I say cautiously. “We’re not there yet, but I’m working on it.”
“Look at you.” Paul laughs. “Never thought I’d see the day.”
“Hang on. Didn’t you bet money me and Abby would get together?”
“Sure.” He shrugs. “I thought it was inevitable that at some point you and Abby would date, she’d fall in love and you wouldn’t, then you’d smash her heart into teeny, tiny smithereens and your friendship would be shot.” I glare at him, and he winces. “Don’t take it personally, Marcus, but I’ve known you for a long time. When you said the L-word at lunch last week, I nearly fell off my chair. If Jess had proposed a bet that was about love, I’d have bet way more money, and I’d have bet against you.”
“Thanks, asshole,” I mutter.
“So if you’ve been bitten by the love bug, I guess you’ve changed your thoughts on marriage, too?”
“Marriage?” I repeat, then I shake my head. “Fuck, Paul, we’re not even together yet—not really. That’s a bit of a stretch.”
“But it is in the cards if you do win her over, right?”
“Can I imagine living with her forever, as friends? Easily. Can I imagine being with her together, as a couple? Maybe. Do I think we need to make that formal in any way if we do figure it out and end up together? Definitely not. But if Abby feels the same way I do, we’ll figure something out.”
“I see,” he says thoughtfully. “But...you think you’re in love with her, right?”
Argh. The last thing in the world I expected from Paul this morning was for him to make me talk about my feelings. I swallow and shrug.
“I don’t know. I feel something for her.” Something amazing. Something miraculous.
“And this is the same Abby Herbert we’ve been hanging out with since college, right?”
“I don’t like that tone.”
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but didn’t Abby linger in that job at the online magazine for years after she started making good money off her gaming content?”
“What’s that got to do with anything? She plays it safe. I mean—yeah, she probably should have quit a lot sooner, but by that point she had a shitload of cash and a thriving business to fall back on. She’s not like us—she couldn’t have done what we did with our business.”
“Why not?”
“Well, she’s just not the kind of woman to throw all of her eggs into a basket unless she knows it’s a sure thing.” He laughs triumphantly, and I scowl. “Fuck off, Paul.”
“So, you’re going to tell her you still don’t want to settle down if things start to get serious between you, yeah?”
“I won’t hurt her, so yes, of course I’ll make that clear, too,” I mutter.
“Good,” he says, and I stop walking. Paul stops, too, and turns back to face me.
“You think she’s going to want the tiny handcuffs,” I surmise, and he waggles his ring finger at me and nods. My gaze sticks on the solid silver band. He’s still wearing his wedding ring, and I don’t understand that at all—Isabel left, and she’s made it clear that she’s never coming back. They can’t even have a civil conversation anymore. Why would he want to wear that? Surely it’s nothing more now than a reminder of the failure of his marriage.
Paul’s expression softens, and he says quietly, “They aren’t meant to be handcuffs, idiot. They’re meant to be an anchor. Storms come in your life together, and the anchor keeps you where you’re meant to be. I mean—in my case, Isabel hacked the fucking chain off the anchor and set us both adrift in a hurricane but...the idea was that we’d promised each other we’d stick it out together.”
“You’re not much of a spokesman for wedded bliss, Paul.” I sigh, then add, “Are you ever going to take that thing off?”
“One day,” he says. He glances down at it, then shrugs. “I still feel married. I made a commitment, and Isabel’s commitment might have meant jack shit when the going got tough, but my promise to her meant something. I don’t know what to make of that myself yet, but I do know...if you and Abby decide to try to be together romantically, sooner or later she’s going to be looking for stability. It should tell you something that even I can see that that is the kind of woman Abby is. Plus—Marcus, Jesus—I don’t get why a fucking kid doesn’t scare you, but as soon as I say the word marry, your balls shrivel up. If you get her pregnant, you’re tied to her forever, anyway, so what difference does it make?”
I start to jog again, and he steps around some trash cans and falls in beside me.
“Let’s say she feels the same way I do right now, and then we have a baby,” I say slowly. “And we’re together for a while, and then we don’t want to be together anymore. I walk away, she walks away, we still parent the kid together and we don’t have to look back at the time we spent together as a couple and see it as a failure. We both go in with our eyes open, and no one is devastated if things need to change. What’s so wrong with that? Some people want to get married, some people don’t. And some people never wanted to get married in the first place, let alone after they heard all about how the happiest married couple they knew split up and now can’t even agree on a property settlement.”
“Marcus. You’re so screwed.”
“Well, would you get married again? After what you’re going through right now?”
He grins at me. “In a heartbeat. If I ever felt the way I felt about Isabel again, I’d want to know that we both intended to be in it forever.”
“Even though that meant nothing with Isabel. Even though things got rocky and she walked away, and now you’re wrangling your way through a messy divorce,” I say incredulously. Paul’s mouth tightens.
“Isabel gave up on us, not me. If I’d known she was unhappy, I’d have gone to the ends of the fucking earth to fix things. The only reason we’re in the situation we’re in now is that she didn’t let me know—she just walked away. Even so, there was something great about the years we did have together. There’s a kind of safety in a commitment like that.”
I shake my head at him.
“I think we’re going to have to agree to disagree on this one.”
“Or we shelve the conversation and come back to it again in a few months.”
“After Izzy fucks you over some more, you might see sense,” I mutter, and he laughs bitterly.
“That’s a real possibility. But it’s far more probable that you’ll try this bullshit on Abby and she’ll tell you to fuck off.”
“She won’t,” I say confidently. “If we get that far, we’ll figure it out together.”
“I’d wager another bet right now, but I think you have enough at stake.” Paul laughs softly. “Should we call it early and grab some breakfast?”
I sigh and nod. “Yes, but you’re pissing me off today, so you’re picking up the check.”