Page 105 of The Dating Pact

It had been one month. One miserable month since I’d seen Brooke in person, and I finally had a night out by myself to head to Walt’s.

When Nate spotted me from behind the bar, he tapped Tabitha on the shoulder, said something to her, then hopped around to the other side, clapping my hand to pull me into a hug. Tabitha slid two pints our way, and I murmured my thanks.

She offered me a jut of her chin in return then pivoted away from me to fill two more pints.

I lifted the beer to my lips. “She doesn’t talk much, huh?”

“Tab?” He slung a lazy arm over the back of his chair, eyeing her. “Takes her a bit to warm up.”

She placed the other two beers on the bar top, obviously for Dylan and Liam, who hadn’t arrived yet. Then she slanted her dark eyes to Nate, who grinned at her. “Thanks, tabby cat.”

She didn’t return the smile. “Be a good little boy and take your party over there. Leave these seats for the paying customers.”

Nate clucked his tongue at her but picked up his pint and Liam’s Guinness, so I took my lager and Dylan’s Sam Adams, and we stood in the corner around a high-top like the apparent good little boys we were.

A minute later, Liam ambled in, appearing like he was coming right from work at the university and accepted his beer from Nate with a pat on the back. Then he proceeded to down about half of it.

“You all right?” I asked, and he thumped the pint glass down on the table with a nod.

“I got stuck teaching a one-hundred-level intro to poli-sci class, and they’re driving me nuts. They email me like they’re texting their friend. One of them sends his assignments in as screenshots. Another doesn’t format her papers correctly.”

“Formatting her papers incorrectly, oh no,” Nate mocked.

Liam swiped his hand over his hair, looking exhausted. “Plus, we’re trying to get Finn tested for ADHD, and that’s a whole thing.” He blew out a breath. “Everyone’s like, he’ll grow out of it, he’ll grow out of it. You just have to be stricter with him. He’s not growing out of it, and we don’t have to be stricter with him.”

“Be stricter with who?” Dylan asked, appearing at the table with a backward baseball hat and red lipstick on his jaw.

I tapped my chin, subtly letting him know about the makeup, but Nate noticed first.

“Don’t tell me that’s my sister’s lipstick on your face.”

Dylan shrugged. “Okay. I won’t.”

“So what’s up with Finn?” I asked, trying to get back on track.

Dylan scrubbed at the red lipstick with his palm while Liam explained, “The wait list for pediatric psychologists is a mile long.”

It had been hard enough for me to find a therapist for my kids when Mira’d died; I suspected child psychologists were as busy, if not more. “I know how that is. I’m sorry, man.”

Liam pushed up the sleeves of his sweater and rolled his shoulders as if shaking off the day. “Eh, it’ll work out eventually. What about you?”

I wagged my head side to side. “Okay.”

My three friends stared at me.

“Amelia loves kindergarten.”

They waited.

“Sebastian’s struggling in his math class a little bit.”

And waited.

I reclined against the wall, attention on one of the televisions. Some car commercial.

“What about you and Brooke?” Nate asked.

I took a sip of my beer, watching a couple kiss on screen, all happy and smiles. “We’re fine.”

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