Page 54 of Weekends with You

“You’ve a long line of ex-lads, then?”

It was my turn to laugh. “Hardly. A couple of insignificant relationships over the years, nothing worth remembering. No one who put in the proper effort, really.”

“Wankers, then,” he said. “The whole lot of them.” I might have also been embarrassed by my confession, but his smile changed my mind. “More wine?”

I swallowed what was left in my glass and held it out to him. “Please.”

By the time the class was finished, we’d all eaten way more than we’d gotten onto the boards. The few couples in front of us took turns whispering to each other and turning around to give us dirty looks, but we were having too much fun to care. We took our boards to high-top tables in a room across the hall to eat, mingle, and keep drinking. While everyone else was looking lovingly into each other’s eyes, clinking champagne flutes, and holding hands across their tables, we were throwing grapes into each other’s mouths, putting on fake posh accents, and reminiscing loudly on Valentine’s past.

“Remember that bloke Jan brought home last year?” Raja said. “The one who burned a hole in the couch with a cigarette?”

“Better than the one you brought home the year before, who left to go see his ex in the middle of the night,” Jan said.

“We’ve really brought home some winners, huh?” Raja laughed. How she laughed these things off instead of getting upset about them, I would never understand.

“Cal, what’d you get Isla for Valentine’s Day?” Liv asked. “Anything good?”

Cal sighed, then looked around and leaned in to speak. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this,” he said, “especially because I know none of you can keep a secret, but here goes.” He pulled out his phone and scrolled through his photos, then turned the screen to us. We stared in silence at a picture of a glittering diamond ring in a suede box.

“Oh my god,” I whispered.

“Bloody hell,” Henry said from behind me.

“You’re proposing?” Liv said, suppressing a squeal.

“Our Callum is becoming a man, is he?” Jan said.

“All right, all right, settle down.” Cal put his phone back in his pocket. “But yes, I am proposing. We’ve been together since school, and I can’t imagine my future with anyone else, so it’s time.” It was the most I’d ever heard Cal say about Isla, and it might have just been the wine, but my eyes felt a bit misty.

“Does that mean you’re leaving us, too?” Liv asked, and Cal laughed, a warm, hoarse laugh.

“It’s about bloody time I leave you lot. Isla and I have been doing long distance for too long, so we’ve started looking at properties near her parents’ farm in Scotland. It’s looking like we’re going to sign by the end of the summer, then I’m on my way out.”

Liv threw her arms around him first, then the rest of us piled on. He was arguably the least affectionate person in the house, second only to Margot, but he let us have our moment.

“I can’t believe everyone’s leaving,” Liv said.

“Let’s relax,” Finn said, gesturing to himself. “Not everyone.”

“Let me rephrase. I can’t believe all the good blokes are leaving,” she said.

Finn opened his mouth to argue, then decided against it. “They are good blokes,” he said. “Better than the two of us, anyway.” He looked to Jan, who nodded in agreement. “Can’t argue with that.”

“Are you leaving before Henry, then?” Margot asked Cal.

“Depends on when Henry leaves,” Cal said, raising a thick brow.

Henry waved him off, taking a large sip of wine. Too large, as far as I was concerned. “Must we talk about leaving?” he said. “Can’t we just enjoy the time we have as flatmates without always worrying about when we’ll no longer be flatmates?” He appeared to be addressing the group, but a small part of me worried that this was directed at me. He smiled and raised a glass, which softened the edge in his voice. “To Margot, for another great Warehouse Weekend,” he said.

“Yeah, this was a great idea, Mar,” Jan said, downing the last of his wine. “Thanks for this.”

“That’s how you know Jan’s three sheets to the wind,” Raja laughed. “He’s actually complimenting Margot.”

“Is it so hard to believe that sometimes I can be nice?” he asked.

“Yes,” we all said at once.

“You’re all arseholes.”

---