Chapter Text
Two huge things happen during the lead-up to Misha's freshman year at Singer. Firstly, he and Vicki break up. She's going out to UC-Berkeley while Misha's heading for Chicago (technically, a suburb thereof, far enough away that it's not listed as Chicago on the mailing labels, but really, who's counting). They're still best friends, and they're both going west for school, but it really doesn't seem right for them to stay bound to each other. Not when they'll be in different states. Not when they want different things out of a relationship. Breaking up makes sense. It's almost perfunctory.
Secondly, Misha meets one, Matt Bomer, who by some accident ends up being his first boyfriend.
Matt is tall—taller than Misha, easily six-two, which is taller than Omegas are supposed to get—and for lack of any better word, he's exceptionally pretty. They first meet on freshman move-in day and Misha legitimately gasps when he moves to shake Matt's hand, finds himself tugged into a hug instead. Apparently, trading emails for the last few weeks of summer means that they might as well be friends already—and despite his initial reluctance, Misha gets one of Matt's tight, gentle squeezes, catches a whiff of his scent, and relaxes immediately. Matt smells warm, like home and his personality.
Matt's an Omega, like Misha, and they're meant to share a double room on the second floor of Winchester Hall, the exclusively Omega dorm. And based just off their initial introduction, Misha guesses that he'll probably like living together. He has no idea how accurate that statement will prove to be, or how much he'll come to like their arrangement.
Although Matt and Misha find a few other guys, most of the other students on their hall—and on every other floor—are girls, and many of them have some variation on the same story: their parents didn't want them going off to some big city (suburb), getting knotted by an unscrupulous Alpha or claimed by an adventurous Beta, and possibly getting knocked up and forced to drop out, considering all the hoops Omegas have to go through for abortions or the morning-after pill. For any kind of birth control, at that, including fucking condoms—hence why student health services keeps all the dorms supplied with them.
None of which makes any sense to Misha, when his RA (a sunny blonde named Adrianne) and the other first-year girls explain it over getting-to-know-you exercises. For one thing, it's all news to him—like, he knew that it was bad for Omegas and worse for girls, but he had no idea that they seriously needed doctor's notes and legit prescriptions to get condoms (Misha has no idea if he needs one or not), that doctors and pharmacists could refuse to help someone out because it goes against their conscience. He didn't know how many insurance providers refuse to cover abortion services for Omegas.
For another thing, it really, really throws Misha through a loop. Like, he'd think that, with all the talk about overpopulation and resources and stuff like that, it'd just be logical to give people who can get pregnant more easily more access to birth control. So much for logic—and that's when Misha really gets it for the first time. That's when it really hits him: so many people really think of Omegas as breeding factories and nothing else. While he's immersed in a getting-to-know-you workshop with everyone else on his hall. Sitting next to Matt, in a circle on the floor of their common area. And all Misha wants to do is burrow away somewhere until the whole Alpha/Beta/Omega bullshit just dies off and no one has to deal with it ever again.
For Misha, being housed in Winchester Hall is a case of personal choice. Mom and Dad understand wanting to be around other Omegas, but had some choice words about Misha potentially "limiting himself." And Misha gets that—he really does—but about the last thing he wants is to end up in heat on a mixed hall, having to explain to some jack-off Alpha that no, he doesn't want to have sex with them, he can get himself off just fine, thank you very much. Never mind having to do so right in the middle of going completely out of his goddamn skull with lust that's inexplicable because it never has a target, just a series of desires. It might not even be lust. Lust is supposed to take objects, make references to people who are explicitly desired.
Since figuring out the word for himself, Misha's tried reading up on asexuality, but aside from a few things he and Vicki found online, he hasn't found much of anything. He can hardly explain things to himself while clear-headed, and he certainly doesn't bring it up for the rest of the group, so how can he expect himself to explain them to someone else while losing himself in a heat? It's just easier, he thinks, to keep his explanation limited to, "I didn't want to deal with the guys who just want to knot a male omega to say that they have, or the people who believe all of the stereotypes and shit. It's just too much, y'know?"
But Matt's different, or so they find out when it's his turn to share. Like Misha and all the others, he chose the Omega dorm because he wants to be around other Omegas—but he wants to be around other Omegas because he prefers being around them to being around anybody else. Nothing about personal security, or worrying about Alphas who don't bother to keep a hold on themselves. The way that Matt puts it during Adrianne's getting-to-know-you workshop? He just really likes being around Omegas—he likes Omegas-only spaces—and for all that's what Misha gets out of Matt's introduction, he also gets that it's probably some kind of understatement.
"I'm Matt, from Houston, Texas, probably going to be a theater major," he says with a beaming smile. "I just turned nineteen—I took a year off to do some local theater back at home? I'm gay—" He pauses for long enough to glance over at Misha, which makes Misha's whole mouth go dry and sets his stomach twisting with guilt—he doesn't even know what he's done to feel guilty for, but he still feels it. Doesn't matter that he can't tell what the Hell sort of expression Matt's trying to make—concerned, angry, knowing, a mix of all three, what does it matter when his face is so ambiguous—Misha still feels like he's the puppy that just pissed on the carpet. He still feels this gaping hole in the pit of his chest.
Trembling, feeling his cheeks flush hot, Misha bows his head. Stares at the nubby grey carpet as though it has all the answers he could want. He can't hold Matt's gaze—he probably could, but the idea of it makes the heat spread to his neck until Misha's certain that he looks like a tomato. Matt might as well be one of the mythical Alphas—the ones from the stories who could actually make Betas and Omegas cower and bare their necks with one glance. They're not supposed to be real, but Misha supposes that the stories must come from somewhere—or maybe he's just being ridiculous about this, because that's more than been known to happen. Whatever the cause, though, he still gasps, sighs in relief when he manages to glance up at Matt and Matt pointedly looks away.
It feels like they've sat here, locked in some display Misha doesn't quite understand, for ages. But his watch swears that it's hardly been any time at all. And then, as though nothing happened, Matt picks right back up: "And, uh… I'm into Omega liberation and queer liberation stuff, actually? All of that, 'the personal is political,' rebellious, protests and revolutionary-minded stuff. I want to go into that, if I can't end up as an actor? Oh, and my hobbies? Are mostly soccer and swimming. And making a total ass of myself on stage, but that's, like, my calling more than a hobby, really?"
Misha can't help blinking at Matt when he says this. No one else has mentioned their sexuality, aside from oblique references to boyfriends and the birth control issue—and seriously, how crazy does Matt have to be to actually admit something like that? He can't be ignorant of what could happen to him for saying that he's gay—the world's bad enough for gay Betas and Alphas, but being an Omega means that the word, the identity, has so much more attached to it—and Matt has to know that. Everybody knows it.
So how can he just sit there, smiling as Adrianne asks him if he's got a boyfriend back home (no, but there's a guy he's interested in—a stage manager named Simon), does he have any fun facts to share about himself (well, they don't seem like they'd translate well, they're kind of inside jokes with friends back home), and so on and so forth. How can Matt just tell everyone sitting here—all of them people he's only just met—that he's gay and trust them to take it well?
After he does, though, a pouty-lipped blonde named Rachel admits to being bisexual and a fairy blonde named Portia confesses that she's a lesbian—both of them are into the same things as Matt, at least they're into the same liberation-flavored ones—and Misha still can't believe he's hearing any of this. At all. He's thought other guys were pretty, and he's crushed on a few of them as well—his fair share, he guesses—but the only person in the world who knows is Vicki. Telling other people just seems so… unfathomable. At the very best.
Other people have never given Misha reason to think that they'd understand. Not when they have stereotypes like all male Omegas are gay, all Omegas are submissive, all Omegas are dying to have a huge, thick knot stuck in them for hours while they get fucked into the mattress, there's no such thing as Omega lesbians, and what would they do with each other anyway. Not when people actually believe that two Omegas can never be in a relationship with each other. Not when there's nothing Misha knows of that might make the rest of the world wake up and treat each other better, or at least stop assuming things.
He doesn't manage to look at Matt for the rest of the getting-to-know-you workshop. A few stray glances here and there, sure—most of them at Matt's impeccable, Disney prince jawline—but he can't look at Matt. Not properly. Misha's still not sure whatever the faux pas he made is, if it's anything at all. And all he can think is that whatever he's done has probably broken everything—he wouldn't blame Matt if he started filling out a roommate switch form tonight.
***
Once they've all shared a pizza dinner and ice cream bars, once Adrianne tells them they're free to go, Misha dallies about getting back to his and Matt's room. Because going back to the room might mean having to talk to Matt about what just happened, and Misha's not sure he wants to do that. He wanders to the bathroom, the vending machines, up to the top floor and back, and he only heads home when he can think of nothing else to do with himself. Nothing that wouldn't require leaving the building, anyway. Which he can't rightly do unless he doesn't want to get back in, since his student ID is, guess where? Back in the room.
Misha flops down, face-first, onto his bed as soon as he gets there, barely registering that Matt's sitting at his desk, hunched over a notebook and scribbling something. He doesn't kick off his sneakers until his face is buried in one of his pillows. Vaguely, he wants to apologize to Matt, it's just… Misha's pretty short on words, at the moment. There's pretty much no good way to tell someone, Hey, look, I don't know what I did to piss you off so royally at the hall meeting, but we should probably work out a roommate agreement unless you want to get a new one in the first place, because I don't blame you, if you do? But I really am sorry for the thing I did that was so offensive. Generally, apologies need to have an admission of guilt.
And then Matt takes charge of the situation—something that he'll come to do much more often as they get to know each other better—by sighing. Coming over and asking if he can sit on Misha's bed. Misha nods into the pillow and mutters that it's fine by him, and budges over just in time for Matt to drop down next to his head. Misha turns his head enough to see Matt leaning against the wall. Maybe it's just Misha's imagination playing tricks on him, maybe he's just looking for excuses not to say something, but he could swear that Matt looks even more like a freaking Prince Charming from this angle. It's goddamn unseemly. Human beings are not allowed to be this pretty.
"Look, I'm really sorry for whatever I," he starts to say, right as Matt says, "I embarrassed you at the hall meeting, didn't I? …I'm sorry."
Misha blinks up at Matt, waiting for him to make any more sense than he currently is. It shouldn't be that hard for him to manage, since he's currently making no sense whatsoever—but all Matt does is tilt his head at Misha, wrinkle his nose a little bit. "Look, I know what I did was pretty un-kosher," he says after a long, silent moment. "I should've just asked if you're into guys, but… I mean, I guessed you were—nice move, by the way? Waiting for your parents to leave before unpacking the anthologies of queer BDSM erotica—but you kind of left them on your desk?"
Groaning, Misha thumps back into his pillow, intent on burying himself in it and not coming out until the urge to be somebody else, anybody else, is completely gone. He could fucking kick himself over this. Over forgetting to put his stupid spank-bank material away before letting Adrianne drag him and Matt off to the hall meeting. For one thing, there's how he'll look to anybody who finds the two books and three magazines. Never mind that they were a birthday present from Vicki and he's only gotten himself off to some of the stories, some of the pictures. There is no way he could excuse a collection where most of the stories are guy-on-guy but most of the pictures are girl-on-girl. Misha's fond of both kinds, which means whoever found them would conclude that he's gay, an objectifying misogynist, or both.
And he can't bring himself to explain any of this to Matt. It's a miracle that he manages to look up at Matt when he says: "And, like, I know that concluding things doesn't give me any excuse for what I did, but…" He sighs, gently knocks his head into the wall. "I guess I just got kind of presumptuous and jumped the gun because you really remind me of the first guy I really liked. He was another Omega, and gay, and kept himself in the closet in a bunch of horrifying, self-destructive ways, and I should've just asked, but asking him never did anything and I was scared, and I assumed…"
Another sigh. He brushes his hand back through his hair. "So, I'm sorry."
"I thought I needed to be apologizing to you," Misha mumbles against the pillow. "For… something. I didn't even know what I did, or what I could've done, I just… thought you were mad at me for something? Anything I said?"
Matt shakes his head. "Less at you, more with the world in general, and the hall meeting kind of brought it out. Up to the forefront of things, I mean." He starts rotating his wrists, knocking his hands into each other as though this communicates something. "I don't think I'm perfect or anything. I just started getting into the queer liberation, Omega liberation stuff when I was sixteen? Maybe seventeen? And I only got there because I have this cousin who introduced me to it and, anyway."
He huffs discontentedly and drops his arms into his lap. Folds his hands together. "I just hate getting reminded that not everyone knows how much of a good thing we've got going on for us," he says. "How we don't have to sell ourselves out and just bare our necks to people who want to stomp on them. Because that's basically what we're doing—we're selling ourselves and the scraps we get in return aren't even worth it—they're not even the most basic things. And people don't get that how this isn't just the way things are, how it's really something we can fight, you know?"
Misha doesn't but that's okay, Matt can go on, if he wants to. And he does: "I just wish more people understood how being an Omega is nothing to be ashamed of, even if we fit the stereotypes that get used against us—gay man…" He arches an eyebrow down at Misha. "Submissive?"
"Theoretically, yes," Misha says, for all he knows that he's missing the point. "In practice… I wouldn't really know, at least not that much—"
"Virgin?" Matt sounds… not surprised. But curious, maybe. "Wouldn't've guessed it. Hot, intelligent guy with a stash of BDSM erotica that he forgets to put away… Doesn't scream virgin, to me." …Okay, he's definitely curious.
"I'm not a virgin, either, but…" Misha tells him, and for a moment, he buries his face back in the pillow, because the door's closed, and it locks behind them, and he still cannot believe he is talking about this to someone who isn't Vicki. "My ex-girlfriend and I only had sex once, and our playing around with kink—any kind of kink—was pretty limited, and I'm not…"
Trailing off, Misha beats his forehead into the pillow, wishes he at least had better access to the mattress. It'd hurt more and be a better outlet for his frustration. Dammit, he knows the word for this, so why can't he just say it? It isn't even that he forces himself to make eye-contact with Matt, to look up at his bemused, encouraging smile, because that actually gets him talking again: "You really deserve to know, if you're interested in me, like, at all? It's not… It isn't unreciprocated, but… I have this thing? Where I'm not really bi? Well. Not bisexual anyway—I've been into guys and girls both, and I like getting off, and you seem great and all, but… This thing I've got going for me? It's sort of lacking the part where I'm interested in people? Like, sexually? …Do you get what I'm trying to say?"
"Not really," Matt says without shame or reserve. "But if you're pushing to get to know each other better first? I'd be fine with that. …And maybe we can trade explanations tomorrow? I'll talk about my social politics, you talk about your sexuality, we'll let the conversation go wherever it does and get to know each other better? Maybe over coffee? Maybe after that orientation seminar that sounds totally boring and unnecessary?"
Misha snickers. Smirks. Nudges his toes at Matt's ankle and supposes that… yeah, coffee and conversation sounds good to him. "And, hey," he adds, "at least this week won't be all bad, right? There's us, sure, but then we've got that cabaret show to look forward to on Friday? With the drag queens? That'll be awesome even if you don't end up being my date for it. And something tells me that you just might."