Chapter Text
Ash liked his brother's hockey friends. Mostly.
Or, rather, he liked the Centaurs hockey friends he'd met.
Most of the time.
Alex Holmberg was "one of the kids", and it was a damn good thing Ash mostly liked his brother's hockey friends. Because now he was living with them.
Leaving Kingston had come with a lot of heartache and enough anti-psychotics and anti-depressants to kill a horse, but it was still a lot to adjust to living with a trio of frat-bro-y hockey players with very little sense or understanding of the word boundaries.
The only reason he'd been able to move in to the extra room in the four bedroom house halfway between downtown Ottawa and the rink was thanks to Tanner Dillon, who had been traded the previous season.
"New rule," Ash declared, arms crossed. LaPointe, Young and Alex all looked at him with hands shoving food into their mouths. "Okay. Two new rules. One, use some fucking utensils oh my god." He shoved a fork at Young who had a fist full of scrambled eggs, and spoons at LaPointe and Alex for their respective oatmeal and protein packed yogurt. "And two; if any of your hockey gear leaves the arena again I will personally fill your rooms with cow shit."
"How would you even get your hands on cow shit?" LaPointe asked.
Ash leaned over the kitchen island. "Do you really want to find out?"
"Nope!" LaPointe squeaked.
He opened the fridge and shut it quickly. "The fuck sort of science experiments are you keeping in there? This is why none of you are getting any. You live in a fucking pigsty and there's a hole in the living room wall that you covered up with a shit TV mount."
"You could move out," Young chirped.
"I work a 18$ an hour job. You three earn hundreds of thousands of dollars. I know Alex's contract and LaPointe had a better point total going into the draft so you definitely get paid more." Ash grabbed his coat and the keys to Alex's tiny two-seater. "Fucking google a contractor to fix the hole and mount the TV properly. It's like, 10k. Max."
Ash did, actually, mostly like his 18$ an hour job. He worked at a cafe attached to a smaller art gallery in one of the historic buildings downtown. He could walk from the employee parking lot to the art store he loved and he worked with so many people, none of whom were cishet.
The cafe was just a cash register, tiny baked goods cabinet, and a decent espresso machine with a mini-fridge, but the art on display (for prices Ash could never afford nor sell his own for) was constantly changing.
"Why do you smell like hockey boy sweat?" Kiara asked. She was an arts major at UOttawa, and her little sister played hockey. "I know that scent way too well."
"Training camp started up, so all the guys are home and they all suck at basic existing." Ash shoved one of the slightly-better-than-McDonalds egg McMuffins in the microwave to heat up, tallying it out as his full shift snack. "I'm going to make them call a fucking exterminator fumigator-ator person."
"Aren't they like-"
"They're 22. You want oat milk?"
"I've had a coffee this morning, I'll make my shift drink after break. Do hockey guys just age differently?"
Ash laughed. "Yeah kinda, it's supposed to be on their captain to sort them out but one assistant captain has an infant and the captain is a little busy trying to navigate the fallout of everything. They don't have time to fix their frogs."
"So it falls to the minority household member to fix it, typical white cis men," Kiara sighed and started the initialization process on the little TD card terminal that took forever.
Most of the reason Ash liked the cafe was the speed; it didn't have a drive thru, and most of the people who came in were coming in for the art and would happen to want a coffee. There wasn't ever really a rush unless the art class from the local alternative high school came in to poke around, and even then it wasn't a real rush.
Most people, of course, excluded Ash's twin brother who worried over him in the most obnoxious of ways and liked to show up whenever he had a long enough break or late enough start to practice to drive from the arena to the gallery.
"One of these days I'm going to give you pure espresso grounds in a cup," Ash threatened, not looking up from the sketch he was working on.
"He's respectful and cute," Kiara whispered as she made Alex his drink. "And he tips well."
"Remember how you were complaining about hockey boy stink?" Ash retorted.
Kiara ignored him. "How's training camp going?"
"It's only the first day, but coming back after making it to the playoffs feels different." Alex beamed proudly. "We did that!"
"You sure did, buddy," Ash aimed for disinterest but he was just as proud of his brother as his brother was of his team.
"Here ya go, Alex," Kiara handed him his coffee with a wink.
Alex looked at Ash who shook his head. "Nope. No dating my friends. Especially not with the house looking like it does."
"Ash," Kiara whined.
"Nope. The only reason we survived high school was him keeping out of my friends' pants. We're keeping that going, besides," he placed a hand on Kiara's arm, "no amount of money in the world is enough to put up with that shitty house and the shit manners in it."
"I do not have shit manners," Alex insisted.
"Mhm. I've talked to your ex-girlfriends." Ash smiled sympathetically at his twin. "Sorry to break it to you, bud, but you suck at dating."
"Oh?" Kiara asked, eyes sparkling. She loved gossip, especially gossip that didn't involve her.
"Wait what?" Alex frowned. "But like, I got them all flowers and paid and shit?"
"Oh buddy," Kiara fixed a pitying look on Alex. "That's not what makes you good at dating."
"Oh." He looked down at his coffee cup then back at Ash then back at the cup. "I. Have to get back to practice-"
"Go, I'll see you later-" Alex was already walking away in a half-daze. "I love you!" Ash shouted at his back when he reached the door.
That made Alex stop, his head jerk up and look at him. "Love you too," he replied, entirely too serious in a way that made Ash feel guilty, sick to his stomach, and safe all at the same time.
"At least he's got secure relationships with his family," Kiara mused.
And that felt like ice stabbing into Ash's heart. "Yeah. He does," he said in the most neutral, flat tone he could.