3. Chapter 2
Chapter 2
Seb
I take a hit off the popper and wiggle my ass at the alpha who is currently fumbling with a condom. The dose helps me relax my body enough to take the double penetration promised by hooking up with a gator shifter. It also lets me eke out a bit more slick from glands that haven’t worked quite right since my creep diagnosis. What is the hold up with the condom?
Oh. Gary is struggling with the sticky latex. The issue seems to be stuffing both dicks into the same condom, probably because his drunken coordination isn’t up to the fine motor task. I watch as he tries to line the latex up around both tips and one slips off to the side yet again. Fuck me. I shouldn’t do this. Brush off his ineptitude and inebriation.
I shouldn’t reach for the sticky latex and toss it aside. Kiss away his half-drunk protest as I straddle him and sink down on both of his thick, bare hemipenes. He invited me home to fuck before the last round of shots at the bar, grinning as he pounded them back and told me the whiskey helps him to last longer. Shifters metabolize booze a little faster than static humans, especially bigger species like gators. He knew what he agreed to.
So I only have the slightest twinge of doubt as I lower myself onto him, taking both his cocks to the root. It doesn’t matter that we aren’t using protection. It doesn’t matter that he might not be fully present. He said he wanted it like this and I don’t want him to notice and get all soppy on me if I take rough sex too far for my broken body to handle.
I want it to hurt, and I don’t need a therapist to lecture me about healthier coping mechanisms. Fuck that. This is better than some of the other things I’ve done to blunt the voice screaming at the back of my head that I deserve so much worse than this stranger would dream of doing to me.
Gary can’t knock me up; that’s impossible, even if I smell like omega slick. I always smell like slick when I miss a few doses of my meds. Slick and alpha pheromones.
And he’s not an avian shifter, so it’s not like he can give me anything else either. All he can give me is another meaningless fuck. A moment where I pretend at a connection to a mate I’ll never have. This stranger lets me play at riding the edge of a heat that will never be the real thing again.
Never let me be what an omega should be—I shove the thoughts that sound far too much like the ex-almost-mate who broke my heart aside. I close my eyes against the sting of tears, and fuck myself harder on Gary’s twinned lengths. Cling to his broad back as I ride him. I want to drown out the stench of my wrong, wrong, wrong pheromones in this alpha’s cum. Want him to fill me up, knot me, and make me feel like the omega I used to be. I want to fill my nostrils with slick and jizz and alpha and omega and sweat and musk and—
“Harder, fuck me harder!” I demand, as though he holds the power to stop my spiraling thoughts. He doesn’t.
I score my nails into his back, part of me flashing to the sense memory of my sharp raven talons digging into the flesh of a fresh kill with the local wolf pack. I was so proud to help provide for my family when I first landed that job and pulled my clutchmates in on the scheme. It all seemed so grown up as we scouted for the young wolf shifters, just learning to hunt. Marin was a year older and impossibly cooler and he made me feel so damn special.
For just a second, it’s not Gary I’m clawing at as my memories superimpose the wolfishly charming grin of my first heartbreak over the pleasantly broad face I’m gazing up at. I don’t see Gary hovering over me, only the young alpha who promised me the world before creep broke me. In that instant, I hate the alpha moving inside me almost a fraction as much as I hate myself; I want to hurt him as much as I want him to hurt me. I want his word to cut to the bone, as unerring as Marin’s ever were.
“Ow, that fucking stings,” Gary growls as he slaps my hands away from his back.
The smack, more noise than force, startles me and banishes thoughts of my ex-alphahole. Gary pulls out of me and bodily flips me onto my stomach. For a dizzying moment, the world spins as his mattress bounces under me and my brain catches up with the sudden disorientation just in time to stop a startled shift into my feathers as a reflexive response to the momentary sense of falling.
I shouldn’t be disappointed that all Gary did was toss me effortlessly into a different position. One where I can’t lash out at him again. Splayed belly-down on his sheets, I’m at his mercy. My dick is totally fine with that, so I nestle in and get comfortable.
Garys’ sheets reek of his reptilian scent, like he hasn’t changed them in a while. Good, if my nose is full of him, it’s easier to pretend all the traces of alpha pheromones in the air are coming from him. Not my scent. Not the result of my condition progressing.
I know I’m looking more alpha lately for a few reasons. It’s my own fault I’ve been rationing my hormone dose more to give Rollie enough O. I get breakthrough symptoms regardless, and he’s so much happier presenting as an omega. Whatever side effects the lower dose I’m taking brings, it’s worth it to see Rollie confident in his place among shifter society.
I’ll just have to hope my creep symptoms aren’t progressing on top of taking too low a dose of O. I can’t afford to pay out of pocket for testing again now that the deductible cap on my policy has reset for the year. Damn it. I can hear Marin’s voice in my head, calling me a stupid slut for not planning better. I meant to get the tests scheduled before the holidays, but then it all got away from me and I didn’t. Marin hated sniveling excuses like that.
“Behave,” Gary grunts as he grabs my ankle to haul my ass to the edge of his mattress.
“Make me.” I muffle the words in the gator’s rumpled bedding, imagining how much worse I deserve to be roughed up for all my failings.
“That your way of saying you want it rough?” Gary asks, reading me far too well for a stranger I picked up in a bar.
I nod. Depending on how things go, I might have to look him up next time I have an itch that needs scratching. The hemipenes that were stretching me to my limits before he flipped me over are a major perk.
Gary wrenches my head back by the hair. The sting brings tears to my eyes. “Not good enough, omega, I asked if you want my knots to wreck your hot little hole?”
“Yes. Fuck me, alpha. Stuff me with both of your dicks. Make me hurt—” I whimper as he pins me more forcefully in place.
A painful wrench of his hand in my hair lights up my scalp. I moan and arch back toward him, hoping he’ll take me again. Harder. Hard enough to drown out my thoughts and the ghost of Marin’s voice. I need this alpha to let me just feel.
“Fuck, you smell good,” Gary groans as he sinks back into my ass. I hate my scent these days, hate the sickly sweet synthetic slick I use to make up the difference when my body fails me yet again.
The alpha growls low in his throat, animalistic, like he’s caught up in a rut. I sob as he thrusts in hard. Not at the burn of the alpha’s two reptilian cocks driving into me, stretching me open all over again, or the punishing thrusts.
Nothing could hurt as much as knowing I’ll never get to share a real rut with an alpha mate of my own. Or, hell, share a true heat with any lover. I bite my fist to hold back the sobs and rock back to meet each thrust, willing the alpha to hurry up and knot me already. Make me feel whole. Please, I just want to feel like a normal omega again. Just for a moment.
Except, by the time he comes the synthetic slick isn’t nearly as slippery as when we started. The relaxing effects of the drugs have long since worn off, and the sharp stabbing ache of his dual knots swelling inside of me, stretching me more than my creep-ravaged body can bear, is only a further barbed reminder of everything the disease has stolen from me.
I feel broken as I endure the tie while the alpha moans and fucks his load deeper inside of me, oblivious to the discomfort I’ve gotten so very good at hiding over the years.
It’s not enough. It doesn’t help. Nothing helps. He falls asleep before his knot goes down enough to pull out, snuggling me close as though I’m his teddy bear or something. Oddly apt, I’m nothing but a comfort object to him.
When he finally slips free of my aching hole, I squirm out of his bed, find the clothes I didn’t bother to change out of after Bram’s baby shower this afternoon. I pad down the hall to his kitchen and dress in the dark. After a moment’s hesitation I pause to rummage for a pencil to leave a flirty note for him to call me the next time he’s horny along with my number on his immaculate kitchen counter.
Gary wasn’t the worst fuck, and there are things I could do with two knots. Glorious, messy things I want to share with Rollie. My Rollie who won’t ever be my mate. I don’t deserve a mate, let alone one as wonderful as Rollie. Still, it’s always fun when he agrees to pick up alphas with me, and Gary’s natural inclination toward gentleness commends him for that. Rollie hasn’t ever said explicitly that he’s only interested in alphas, but his family is so traditional I don’t think he’s ever let himself consider that he might want a mate who isn’t an alpha. I consider myself lucky to get to share him with them as often as I do.
I’ll have to vet the gator more before I suggest a threesome with my sweet bestie, but the idea of both of us tied on the same alpha’s dual knots has my abused ass valiantly attempting to slick up and my dick coming to attention. Yeah. Gary is worth feeling out if that’s the payoff.
I sign my note with a lipstick kiss, making sure to get my scent on it for good measure. Alphas like that shit. Ball is in his court, and maybe he’ll be a better fuck when he’s sober, the delicious ache that comes with every step has me hoping for another round. Two cocks and only having to deal with one alpha is a bargain. And the fantasy of sharing him with Rollie is tantalizing.
It’s easy enough to slip silently out of the fifth floor loft apartment that I’m not sure I’ll ever set foot inside again. I wince and sit gingerly in the back of my Uber to Four Corners, the novelty of the ache wears off with the prospect of the long drive home to look forward to.
I stumble over the address I give my driver, starting to rattle off the address of my flock’s apartment complex on autopilot even though it’s been years since I moved out. It’s too painful to be surrounded by my rave, the way my clutchmates and I always intended. Just like our parents raised us there along with a boisterous sub-flock of raucous cousins. Most of the raven shifters I grew up with are mated and raising chicks of their own.
I visit all the time, but I need to have a retreat from the constant reminder of the dreams creep stole from me. Being surrounded by family who mean well, but can’t help being their obnoxious, loving, nosy selves day and night is too much to bear. I love my rave too much to be bitter toward them, but I can’t help that I need a space of my own sometimes. When Bram and Ty got serious, Rollie offered me the haven I needed without me having to spell it all out.
I give Rollie’s address to the driver. I’ve lived with him since I moved out of the apartment I shared with my brother. It’s been years now, but it still doesn’t feel quite like my home.
Part of me misses curling up next to Bram after a night like tonight. I used to climb under his covers and bury my nose in the sweet comfort of his pure, uncomplicated avian omega scent, so like my own, and yet subtly unique. He always used to let me cling to him until I relaxed enough to sleep.
Now he sleeps next to his mate, his belly round with their third child—no, fourth; he’d be livid if he ever caught me not counting his step-daughter, Myra. And she is his kid, even if not by blood. It’s obnoxious how perfect my brother’s family is.
So I go home to Rollie’s cute little house instead of Bram and the flock apartments. Everyone teases us that we’re practically mates, but I know better. Rollie can do so much better than me. It never ceases to astound me that he hasn’t already had enough of my bullshit and told me it’s time to find a place of my own. I know I should move out, for his sake, but I’m not strong enough to deny myself the taste of what it would be like to share my life with a mate who sees and accepts all of me.
The driver seems really into his podcast, so I mess around on my phone to distract myself while we drive. Rollie texted me earlier to confirm he got the message about who I was leaving the bar with. So I guess I already have contact info for Gary the next time I’m craving a double knotting. I don’t have the energy to get into it with Rollie about how he told me the shower was a bad idea. He knows how I need to find a physical way to let out the emotional pain when life gets too intense to handle.
I text Rollie anyway. So he won’t worry about me. It’s a bit of a drive from the trendy heart of Old Port, where my hookup lives, to Four Corners. I wince internally at how much this ride is going to cost me, but I promised everyone who matters I wouldn’t drive drunk again after the last time. That’s one promise I haven’t broken. I rarely drive at all since getting my license back. I never intended to get on the road when I got behind the wheel that night. Or to hurt anyone but myself. My intentions didn’t matter in the end though.
Seb: You can delete his deets. On my way home.
Rollie: Stay safe
Seb: For you? Always ;) *kisses*
I shut off the screen and press it against my forehead, hating that I did this again. I said I was going to turn over a new leaf in the new year, but I blew that promise to Rollie right out of the gate.
My alpha du jour’s knots hurt more than usual tonight. The way it’s not supposed to for an omega. It feels so different from how things used to be and I hate the changes. And I still smell wrong, only with an added layer of reptile musk because apparently drunk and high Seb makes terrible life choices.
I’m sure Rollie will be thrilled to scent an alligator shifter on me. The gator had such a pretty twang to his voice at the bar though. And I had high hopes he knew how to put his unique reptile shifter attributes to good use. Too bad for me he seemed to think all he needed to do was dual wield his dicks to be amazing in bed.
I try not to wake Rollie as I let myself inside. His door creaks. I’ve been meaning to get some WD-40 for that shit. The sound makes me pause, waiting with bated breath for some sign I woke Rollie. There’s no noise from within.
I slip off my shoes by the door and pad softly toward the bathroom to take a shower. I don’t want to smell alpha musk. Not my own and not a stranger’s. I want to scrub myself raw until I can erase all the changes, scrub until I find the omega that used to be under my skin. He’s still who I am, even if the part of me that hates myself insists that’s not true.
The bathroom vent and the hot water should be enough to drown out any sounds I make. The white noise should be relaxing. Rollie doesn’t knock before he lets himself in.
“You okay in there?” he asks, and he knows me too well for me to bother lying.
“Nope.”
“Want company?”
“Mm.”
My best friend steps under the warm spray with me, heedless of the water soaking the pajama pants slung low on his hips. He wraps his arms around me and holds me while I fall apart. I bury my face in his shoulder and I fit against him the way I can’t seem to fit into my own life anymore.
He smells so good. Like the coconut scented lotion he uses as though it’s going out of style and something subtly spicy. Cinnamon and sugar and fresh cookies and everything good in the world. His scent has gotten sweeter since I started slipping him half of my prescription.
I should get a higher dose. My doctor prescribed it because my bloodwork keeps coming back too low. And I would, if I could afford it. The problem is that hormones are expensive. There’s a program Bram’s boss suggested that subsidizes my drug costs, but it only covers valid prescriptions. The zoo has specialists who could prescribe Rollie his own meds, but they only accept patients on the zoo health plan and their immediate families.
Bram tried to get Winny and I covered that way, but it means mates and dependents, not siblings or roommates. It’s one of the many reasons my brother keeps bugging us both to apply for jobs at the zoo. He doesn’t get why being on display like a model specimen of alpha raven shifter virility might bother me.
It’s almost funny that the very condition that drives my need for the zoo’s cushy benefits is what makes working there feel impossible. My scent and my call and even the way my feathers look in the sunlight is wrong with my hormones out of whack. And my doctor at the low-cost clinic already seems suspicious about why the standard dose of O she gives all her avian creep patients isn’t helping me the way she thinks it should. She’s told me that all her other avian patients with creep do just fine on fifty milligrams daily. So she wants to run more specialized labs I can’t afford before she’ll up my dose again.
Of course, I haven’t told her that I’ve been taking half that amount, sharing the pills with Rollie so he can take the lower dose of omega hormones recommended for trans omegas. Nevermind that the formulation for avians isn’t quite the same as the one for raccoons like him. It seems to be working regardless, especially since I started giving him a higher dose.
Neither of us has told anyone. I could stop. Tell him to see a different doctor to get his own meds, but he won’t and he’s so much damn happier since we started this.
He’s finally getting to show the world the omega he always has been inside. My discomfort isn’t enough for me to take that away from him. Not after feeling how truly awful it is to appear to be something I’m not. When other shifters scent me and think ‘alpha’ it makes me cringe. It makes me want to scrub another layer of skin off. It makes it impossible to tell Rollie he has to go back to feeling that way about presenting as a beta again.
I can’t take away his happiness. I won’t. Not when no amount of hormones will actually fix the root cause of what’s wrong with me.
I could take all the hormones in the world and it still wouldn’t restore my normal heat cycles. Wouldn’t let me bear a clutch. It won’t give back my first love and the mating and family I thought I could have. It won’t restore the innocent belief I had in people before the alpha I loved with all my heart stomped the dreams I thought we shared into oblivion. Even if there was an actual cure tomorrow, that betrayal will still haunt me and shape me into someone the starry-eyed version of me from before creep wouldn’t recognize. I’ll still be broken, and Rollie doesn’t have to be.
So I sob in Rollie’s arms and wish I knew a better way. A way to get us both what we need.