Knot Your Basic B*tch (High Fructose Corn Syrup Verse)

1. Chloe

CHAPTER 1

CHLOE

God, all I wanted was just a little bit of peace and quiet.

Rose, my youngest sister, was screaming at the top of her lungs because Zane had taken the last of her favorite yogurt.

Zane was holding both hands up like he was warding off a storm, “There’s two cups of strawberry and three blueberry in—”

He was cut off by more screams like she was being murdered. I don’t know why Zane was trying to reason with a three and a half year old, anyway.

Just one. One quiet morning. That was all that I was asking for.

I sighed, abandoning the last of my cereal, tipping the rest in the trash. It was just too loud. Two of my brothers and one of my moms had popped into the kitchen to see what was happening.

I was halfway out of the room as she started screaming again. Pointing her chubby fingers at Zane. “He took it! He promised he wouldn’t, and he took it!”

There didn’t seem to be much hope of this not turning into an even bigger thing.

It really didn’t seem to me like a huge ask. Just a little bit of quiet. A little bit of space. But growing up in a pack with two moms and six dads made that completely impossible.

Why was having a quiet morning so hard? It’s all I was asking for. This day shouldn’t be so crazy already. It was only eight in the morning.

Back in my room, I reached for my noise canceling headphones, but it wasn’t on my desk. Or knocked on to the floor. I doubted it would be under my bed, but a quick look confirmed it.

Who touched my stuff? This time?

“Cash, do you know where my headphones are?”

“Laundry room!” He yelled in my general direction.

The groan I made could only be described as the enraged battle cry of a wild hippo.

Cash took them sometimes to listen to music. Just grabbed them off my desk when he wanted to go workout.

If he just used them, and then put them back where he found them, that would be fine. But no. Too many times he’d forget. Dumping them in a pile of his sweaty gym clothes.

So maybe I was counting down the days until I was off to college and old enough to go out into the world. Get a room that I don’t have to share.

In my secret dreams, there was nothing better than being able to just sit in a quiet room. Maybe with a cup of peppermint tea, and a good book. Plenty of betas got to have quiet office jobs. I could be something like a secretary, for some calm job. Like the front person at a small dentists’ office. Or maybe a librarian.

Something perfectly boring.

I was destined to be a beta. It was fine. When I was little, maybe I’d had a brief moment of delusion when I thought I’d want to be an omega like my moms. Have my own pack that was devoted to me. How they would help me with everything and worship the ground that I walked on. It all sounded great in theory.

A devoted pack of men was less appealing when you grew up with eight brothers. Had to hear all of them belching and watch the awkward middle school years when they still thought it was okay to pick their noses if they thought that they could get away with it.

Six packs weren’t so impressive, when it seemed like all my brothers managed to have one. And most of my brothers seemed to be allergic to shirts. Just running around, flaunting chiseled bodies like a bunch of cavemen. Even Gunnar, and he didn’t even go to the gym. Just sat around hogging the TV and eating all the donuts before anyone else even got a single one. How were genetics even fair?

No matter what age they were, all of them managed to leave their socks everywhere.

I swear to God, there isn’t a single room in this deodorant-forsaken house that doesn’t have at least one smelly teenage sock lying dirty and crumpled in the corner somewhere.

There was no way in hell I wanted to deal with having my own pack.

Maybe my parents were all on to something when they’d given me a beta name.

I wanted to have a cool name. The Steamy Aura’s Weekly always had lists of the most fabulous omega names.

My brothers and sisters all had cool names… But by the time it got to me, all my parents just started to run out of creative steam.

It was like my other siblings had names taken straight out of the top most interesting names for up and coming alphas and omegas. Zane, Titus, Gunnar, Cash, Rebel, Avril, Bronze, Blue, Cashmere and Ember.

Then they got to me.

By then, they’d just collectively scraped the bottom of the barrel to think of something.

My name is Chloe.

Can you get any more basic and boring than that ?

I have a sister who is literally named Rebel… How is it that my moms and dads could look at one of their infant babies and think that she was a badass Rebel. Then look at me and go.

Oh. Hmmm. That one looks like a Chloe!

The thought made something twist in my stomach.

If it wasn’t so noisy, I’d be able to eat the rest of my cereal and I wouldn’t feel hungry right now.

It made me so mad I was starting to feel hot. I shook my head angrily as I rummaged through piles of unfolded laundry, looking to find where my headphones could be.

Did someone knock over a bottle of perfume in here? Or laundry detergent? With all the noise, and the fighting downstairs, and the heat, this flower smell was the—

“Is somebody perfuming?” I heard someone scream from downstairs.

Oh great. More chaos.

I mean, that wasn’t fair. I’m sure that all my sisters were going to be thrilled.

Which sister was it this time? Blue was a little young. Was it Bronze? But she was at soccer practice…

Besides, the smell was coming from nearby.

I heard a rumble of footsteps and jostling, before the door to the laundry room slammed open and Gunnar, Titus, Zane, and Avril were falling over each other.

They all turned to stare at me.

“What?” I snapped at them.

None of them answered. Titus had an expression that was downright sheepish, as he rubbed the back of his head. Gunnar was staring at one of the laundry baskets like it contained juicy secrets rather than sweatpants.

Zane was my only sibling who cleared his throat to say, “we were trying to figure out who perfumed.”

“Yeah… and? ”

I stared back at them expectantly, but they were all staring at me like I had grown a second head.

If they wanted to go find who was perfuming then why were they standing here staring at…

Oh.

Oh, no.

No, there was no way.

I was perfuming?!

That meant… that I wouldn’t ever get to have my quiet beta life. I was an omega. Most omegas grew up dreaming about their pack.

Yes, it sounded ideal. It was everyone’s dream… everyone’s but mine.

…As more of my brothers and sisters piled into the room, I could just picture it. My own pack of men who would do anything to keep me safe.

And in the process, leave their dirty socks everywhere.

Great. Just great.