Reunion rules
I once made a pact with my best friend to marry him.
To be clear we had never been romantic. We hadn't even kissed. But somehow promising to tie myself to him had been as easy as smiling and saying yes.
At least that is the way Adam told it. And since by the time this promise came back to bite me in the ass in the worst way possible I was merely a geeky editor who loved to hide in books and Adam was a major movie star on a sharp rise to global fame, people tended to believe his version of events over mine.
But I was skipping ahead.
To tell this story properly - my version not Adam’s - I needed to start at the beginning. To a night I hadn't imagined would create a shockwave that would knock me over ten years later.
Forethought and future planning hadn't been in my head the night I made that pact though. Nothing much had been in my head, as I was in the midst of college, it was a Saturday night, and like most weekends, I had probably been tipsy. I couldn't quite remember because the edges of the memory were hazy now, worn away by time and my reluctance to think of it.
But I did recall I was at a party. I was ready to go home, tired from my then-boyfriend's constant complaints, my friend's insistence that I dance, and the spectre of my exams in the coming week.
My best friend since forever- Adam - had already completed his. He had majored in drama while I had had a much heavier load with a language and media arts degree.
Somehow, toward the end of the night, I had found myself leaning against Adam in a dark corner, nearly falling asleep on his shoulder.
He smelled like he always did, a familiar and comforting mix of green apples and geranium and fresh rain. His shirt, soft and rumpled against my cheek, had been enticing me to sink into his chest further.
He had been lean back then, with curly Auburn hair and warm brown eyes, and quite a few inches taller than me. I had always fit into him just right with my short, curvy figure. The hand he had used to stroke my long dark hair had felt warm and firm.
I had barely heard his whispered words, something about getting me back to my dorm, as they washed over my head while the loud music competed for my attention.
“Soon. Just let me lie here for a minute.”
He chuckled and replied. “Only a minute. Don’t fall asleep, okay?”
“I won’t.”
Back then I would have done anything for him. He had been my other half since grade school. So I know I had diligently tried to obey him. I had tried to keep my eyes open and my head from slumping further into his shoulder.
"Do you want me to get Martin?"
"No." My answer was a grumble into his shoulder. "He's been annoying me all night. I think we are over."
"Ahh, yes. The three-month curse."
"It's not a curse. It just happens to take me three months to work out if I want to keep them or not. And I haven't found anyone worth keeping yet."
"Boyfriends aren't goldfish, Lou."
"I know. But it's a big deal, deciding to spend the rest of your life with someone."
"You don't need to marry them. Just start by spending more than twelve weeks with someone."
"Nah, that's too much effort. Besides I have you. I don't need another man."
"I'm your friend. That's different."
"Like you can talk anyway. You haven't had a girlfriend since Amber cheated on you last year."
"And who's to say my next girlfriend won't do the same thing?"
I picked up on the strain in his voice that he was trying to hide. "Not everyone is like Amber. She was a liar and a manipulator." Adam went quiet and I winced. "Sorry, I know you loved her and it still hurts."
"Not as much as it did."
"Well, that's good. That's progress."
I went quiet, worn out from the effort now of simply stringing simple words together. My head dropped even further and my breathing slowed.
The night blurred a little then, the memory losing its sharp focus and becoming a hazy fog. Time distorted as Adam's heartbeat under my cheek beat away the seconds and then minutes in a steady rhythm.
“Lou? You did fall asleep didn't you?”
I did remember that. I remembered Adam shaking me gently as he asked me again if I was awake.
I think I had made a sound, maybe a whimper as I tried to hold onto him even as he was trying to straighten me away from his body. Then I'm sure he sighed before saying quietly. “The two of us make a fine pair. You are terrified of commitment and I can't trust anyone. If we are both single in ten years, let's just get married to each other okay?"
I had depended on him back then. I had counted on Adam so much that I would have even agreed to his silly idea, phrased half as a joke and half as a tease.
I had laughed, trying and failing to think of the name of the frothy romantic comedy that we had just watched together only the night before which was inspiring this out-of-the-blue notion.
I don't recall my answer. But in the years since, I reasoned whatever I had said in response was irrelevant. I was so sure back then that my answer wouldn't matter. I wasn't interested in Adam in that way and he had never once made a move on me.
We were friends. And that moment at a college frat party was all a drunken mistake.
It shouldn't have mattered what I said - no one in their right mind would take our lazy intoxicated conversation seriously.
And to further prove that my version of the whole event is correct, after Adam drove me home we had never spoken of it again.
Of course, all of this was before. It was before Adam moved away after graduation. It was before he stopped being ‘my’ Adam and instead became Adam Monroe - star of a hot new television series, a series of movies, and then the poster boy for teenage fandom everywhere. Basically, before he became an asshole.
It was before he stopped being my best friend, and then stopped being my friend at all.
And then, ten years later, on a day I had thought was going to be completely and utterly normal, that pact came back to haunt me in the most public and humiliating way it could. The shockwave that I had apparently put into motion at that party finally reached me.
