Service Break

The padel ball slammed against the glass wall, a sharp crack that echoed through the empty court. Marco wiped his **palm** on his shorts, staring at Luca across the net. Ten years of friendship reduced to this: a Sunday morning game nobody wanted to play.

"You should have told me," Marco said, bouncing the ball. "Before the wedding. Before I bought the apartment. Before—"

"Before what? Before you built a life around someone who never loved you?" Luca's voice was flat. "I tried, Marco. Every time I almost said it, you'd talk about how perfect everything was. What was I supposed to do?"

A stray **cat** appeared on the court's edge, orange and ragged, watching them with something like judgment. Marco had always wanted one. Elena had insisted they were too messy. Too much commitment.

He served. The ball hit the net.

"She called me yesterday," Luca said, moving to return. "Asked if I'd heard from you. Said you'd moved out. Said she didn't understand why."

Marco laughed bitterly. "She doesn't understand much. That was the problem."

"No," Luca said softly. "The problem was that you loved the idea of her more than who she actually was. And I was the **friend** who watched it happen and said nothing because I didn't want to be the bad guy."

Marco looked at his **palm** again—the crease where he'd gripped the racket too tight, the lines everyone said meant he'd have a long life but not necessarily a happy one. He'd never believed in that stuff anyway.

"Another game?" he asked.

Luca studied him for a moment. Then he walked to the net, extended his hand.

"No more padel," he said. "Let's get a drink instead. And actually talk."

The cat stretched and vanished into the heat as Marco shook his friend's hand, the first real thing they'd shared in years.