амега (peterick)

treize.

Dallon Weekes never smiles.

He doesn't smile at me. He doesn't smile at his boyfriend. He doesn't smile at anyone. He is the connoisseur of not smiling. He's also never here; when he is, he doesn't interact in any way socially, and when he isn't, Buzz never talks about him, and Buzz is the kind of gay person that never shuts up about his love life, existent and not.

In conclusion, I'm 90 percent certain at this point that Dallon has been a figment of my imagination this entire time that I've known him, and that if he smiled, he wouldn't look human. So when I see his face light up at the sight of Newcomer when he enters the bar, flashing a flawless grin, I feel myself die a little bit inside.

"Leo!" he exclaims. He doesn't kiss his boyfriend hello. Buzz doesn't care that he doesn't. I go back to believing he isn't a real person.

"Dallon," Newcomer responds. "It's good to see you, buddy."

They clap their palms together over the bar, forming a firm, boisterous handshake. Buzz lifts his eyes from the martini glass he's been wiping dry with a cloth for last ten minutes, but regards the two Alphas for only a moment before he returns his focus to the tedious task, shaking his head disbelievingly. Patrick is indifferent, almost skittish with his chin resting on my shoulder, but the behaviour is normal for an Omega surrounded by three Alphas. Still, watching Dallon and Leo doing their bro-handshake thing, I feel cast out, like I should be joining in somehow.

"Could somebody please explain to me who the fuck this guy is?" I announce.

Dallon, still grinning, turns to me. "Leo. His uncle works for the ABO. My dad's his boss." He shrugs and leans over the bar with his elbows on the countertop. "I thought, since you're inexperienced, and Leo... isn't... he could help you out with Allie."

"I think I'm a little late for that," Leo chuckles, eyeing my throat as he takes a sip from his beer.

"You're not too late," Buzz chips in. "They haven't even fucked yet."

Leo slaps his drink back onto the bar and angles himself toward me. "Well, I doubt I have any advice that's actually practical, but I could tell you my life story. You could learn from my mistakes, then."

I hold my Omega tighter and clear my throat, pretending to take interest in the bright pink cocktail nobody has bothered to claim since Patrick ordered it. I'm already not a fan of this guy. Maybe I am being overly protective, though, so I conjure up a few potentially useful questions to distract myself from tearing his scalp from his head. "I assume you've been with Omegas before?" I ask.

"A few. My last serious relationship was with a Beta, though."

"See, I want to know how to do that," I say (my question worked). "I can appreciate when someone looks good, and I don't care about genders or ethnicity or anything like that. But I've never had feelings for anyone. I never even had a celebrity crush when I was twelve."

Buzz looks appalled. "What the fuck did you wank to?" he regurgitates.

I roll my eyes.

Leo speaks up again. "It isn't socially normal for Alphas and Betas to date, or Omegas and Betas, but not in the sense that people don't like it. It's actually really common. A lot of couples don't last, because they can't reproduce; some try to adopt, but they usually get turned down. My ex and I tried - we were so desperate to have a family - but we didn't work. We couldn't work."

"Do you not have feelings for me, Petey?" Patrick's timid voice murmurs into my ear.

I run my palms over his shoulders and gently coax him to sit up straight. He stares up at me with round, saddened eyes. It's a good question. It terrifies me. I don't want to lie. "Of course I do. Why would you think I didn't?"

"'Cause when you said you never had feelings for anyone I thought you didn't love me for real."

My mouth opens to object, but Leo beats me to the punch. "Aromaticity is more common that you'd think, too. Especially if you prefer to live alone, or you don't work; Alphas from rich families, namely. It's down to lack of social interaction, at the end of the day; society is lazy; kids don't play outside anymore. Normal hormone activity may well play a part in triggering dormant feelings under particular circumstances - an Omega in heat, for example - but that doesn't mean those feelings aren't real."

I wouldn't have been able to explain it any better than that.

I want to make a remark about how he knows of my rich and secluded upbringing, but my mind is too busy reliving the night Patrick and I had met. His heat was triggered, then. Perhaps my "dormant feelings," as Leo suggests, were triggered in the same way. "Patrick was hurting... The Alpha was hurting him, I had to-"

"You used your instinct," Buzz says. "You did the right thing."

"And you're doing the right thing now. Regardless if the feeling is real or not," Leo adds, his eyes flickering to the back of Patrick's head.

Are the feelings real? Absolutely. If they weren't, I'd be giving up my bed every night to sleep on the couch, because that's what decent human beings do for other people. Patrick isn't "another person," though.

The Omega looks up at at me and frowns. "Petey, I don't feel well," he slurs.

I don't wish for him to be around Newcomer any longer, so I take him home.

I do feel things for him. I'm just not very good at showing it.