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“It’s true,” Bridget mouthed to the room, and everyone laughed.
Liam flushed, and Ambrose jabbed him gently in the ribs. “You’re my favourite, too.”
Marcus, leaning back in an armchair with a glass of white wine perched on the armrest, looked slightly bored, and Ambrose wondered if he was thinking about spreadsheets and figures and exchange rates, or whatever it was guys like Marcus thought about. He caught Marcus’s gaze, and Marcus’s mouth twitched in a faint, mocking smile. Ambrose wasn’t sure if he was mocking Ambrose, or the Connellys, or something else entirely. Probably not himself though, and the way he stood out like a sore thumb among the Connellys. Guys like Marcus, in Ambrose’s experience, didn’t like to take what they dished out.
It was a pain having to get up to reach the charcuterie board, but Ambrose made the sacrifice, loading up enough crackers that he wouldn’t have to move again for a while.
“All I’m saying,” he said, “is if you nailed the board to the top of a train set, and set up a track around the room, that would solve all my problems right now.”
“I don’t think anyone asked,” Marcus pointed out.
Neve laughed, but Ambrose didn’t think Marcus was joking. He jammed a cracker in his mouth and regarded Marcus narrowly.
“God, don’t tell Grandad Billy,” Riley said. “He’d be on that idea in a heartbeat.”
“Well,” Will said, “it’d be a tripping hazard, wouldn’t it?”
As though that were the craziest thing about Ambrose’s suggestion. He looked like he might be seriously considering it otherwise.
“I’m going for a swim,” Riley announced.
“But it’s pouring down!” Fi exclaimed.
“Oh no,” Riley deadpanned, heading out of the room. “I might get wet.”
Bridget put on some annoying children’s TV show for Balian and planted him in front of the screen. He seemed more interested in the olives than whatever was on the screen, and Ambrose respected that. The olives were very good.
“Do you guys want another round of Monopoly?” Bridget asked, giving the box a dubious look.
“Hell, no,” Liam said. “I’m going to see what else is in the games cupboard.”
Ambrose made a small sound of protest as Liam levered himself out from underneath him. But also, he got to watch that arse as Liam walked away, so he didn’t complain too much.
“If we’re playing another game, we probably need more cheese,” Fi decided, and followed Liam out of the room. Ambrose could only assume she’d be back with a charcuterie board large enough to sail to New Zealand on. Again, no complaints. Well, apart from his bladder, which was straining a little because of that last ginger beer.
Ambrose rose and stretched and padded out of the room for the closest bathroom. Of course the Connellys had more than one, and of course they were all immaculate. The entire house was like something that could have featured in the glossy pages of a fancy magazine, but, more than that, it felt like a home, and that was something no photoshoot could capture. The Connellys were the heart of this place, and they filled it with warmth and laughter.
God, Ambrose would have killed to be a part of a family like this when he was a kid.
He used the toilet in the half-bathroom and washed his hands. Then he wiped them down the side of his jeans, even though there was a fluffy hand towel hanging right there, because you could take the boy out of the shitty student share house, apparently, but you couldn’t take the shitty student share house out of the boy.
There was pomegranate-scented hand wash on the edge of the sink. Ambrose didn’t even know what a pomegranate was supposed to smell like. They didn’t have hand wash at their place and, honestly, the shard of soap that lived on their leaky bathroom sink was covered in dust and so dry that a spider lived under it. Still, the shitty share house with its rotating roster of shitty roommates—excluding Harry, who Ambrose loved like a brother—was a home of sorts too. At least, it was more of a home than Mum’s flat in Macquarie Fields. It wasn’t until he’d left there that he’d realised how long he’d spent walking on eggshells around Mum, and what a relief it was when he didn’t have to constantly watch everything he said and did for fear of puncturing her very fragile reality.
The weight of his phone in his pocket reminded him that he should probably call Mum and check in with her. Maybe she’d forgotten that she thought someone had stolen her photograph, or maybe she was spiralling even further into that place where she thought everyone was conspiring against her, jealous of her success.
He drew a breath.
He’d call tonight. Hell, he deserved an afternoon to just laze around and play stupid board games with his not-quite-fake-anymore boyfriend, right?
He opened the bathroom door to leave, moving back in surprise as Marcus stepped inside.
“Um,” Ambrose said, and made a lemme-just-get-around-you gesture, only to find Marcus crowding him up against the sink. “What the fuck?”
Marcus was tall enough to look down at him, even from their sudden and uncomfortably close quarters. “You’ve landed on your feet here, haven’t you? For a guy from Macquarie Fields.”
Ambrose rolled his eyes. Of course Marcus was a total snob. “Yeah, well, not everyone gives a fuck about someone’s postcode, do they?”
“Hey,” Marcus said with a smirk, “I respect the hustle, Ambrose.”
