Chapter Text
The lunch room smelled like microwaved leftovers and burnt coffee, the same as it did every weekday at quarter past noon. Kacey Hathmen had his sketchbook tucked under one arm and his phone in the other hand, halfway through typing a reply to the group chat about Jordan's latest Ramona catastrophe, when he felt the shift in the air that meant someone had stepped directly into his path.
He looked up.
Ren Lassin, one of the male omegas stood there in a lavender crop top that showed a stripe of pale stomach, a pleated skirt that hit mid-thigh, and thigh-high socks that disappeared into white sneakers. His sandy blonde hair fell perfectly straight past his shoulders, and his green eyes were doing that thing they did. Opened wide and hopeful and aimed directly at Kacey like he was the only person in the building who mattered.
Kacey's thumb froze on his phone screen.
"Hi," Ren said, and his voice had that sunshine quality it always had, warm and a little breathless like he'd been hurrying to catch up. "I forgot my lunch."
Kacey blinked. "Oh. That sucks."
"I was going to walk to the sandwich place on Fourth," Ren continued, and he tilted his head just slightly, the movement making his hair shift across his shoulder. "But I don't really want to go alone? Would you come with me?"
There were approximately fifteen other people in the lunch room. At least six of them were alphas and closer to the door than Kacey. But Ren was looking at him with those eyes and that small hopeful smile, and Kacey was not, as a general rule, a dick.
"Yeah, sure," Kacey said, pocketing his phone. "Let me just tell the guys I'll be back."
He detoured to the B Team table in the back corner where Jenny, Jordan, and Alex were already sitting. Jenny had her blazer draped over the back of her chair and was picking at a salad with the expression of someone mentally composing a resignation letter. Jordan was scrolling through something on his tablet with his jaw tight. Alex looked up and smiled when Kacey approached.
"Ren forgot his lunch," Kacey said, gesturing vaguely toward where Ren waited by the door, still watching him. "I'm gonna walk with him to grab something. Be back in fifteen."
Jenny glanced past him, clocked Ren, and raised one eyebrow. "How generous of you."
"It's just lunch," Kacey said.
"It's always just lunch," Jenny said, but she waved him off.
Kacey jogged back to Ren, who lit up like Kacey had just agreed to something far more significant than a sandwich run. They pushed through the glass doors together and out into the September afternoon, the heat lingering in that late-summer way that felt both oppressive and nostalgic at the same time.
The sidewalk was narrow enough that they had to walk close. Ren stayed glued to Kacey's right side, his shoulder bumping Kacey's arm every few steps. When they reached the corner and had to wait for the light, Ren's hand came up and his fingers brushed the inside of Kacey's wrist, just a fleeting touch, there and gone.
"I'm glad you said yes," Ren said, looking up at him. "I hate walking alone."
"It's like three blocks," Kacey said, but he said it with a grin because Ren's whole energy was infectious in a way that made it impossible to be grumpy around him.
"Still," Ren said, and he leaned into Kacey slightly as the light changed and they stepped off the curb.
They passed a coffee shop with outdoor seating where two alphas in expensive suits were sitting across from each other, and both of them looked up as Kacey and Ren walked by. Their eyes tracked the movement, lingered on Ren for a beat too long, then flicked to Kacey with an expression he'd learned to read years ago: Oh, a beta. Playing errand boy for a pretty omega. How predictable.
Kacey felt his shoulders tighten.
"So," he said, a little louder than necessary, steering the conversation somewhere safer, "do you know any cute female omegas who might be into a beta?"
Ren's head snapped toward him so fast his hair whipped across his shoulder. "What?"
"You know," Kacey said, gesturing with one hand, trying to keep his tone casual. "Like, single female omegas. You probably know a bunch, right? Anyone who's mentioned being open to dating a beta?"
Ren's expression split, a flash of something sharp and startled, almost hurt, before it smoothed back into his usual cute softness. "No," he said, and his voice was quieter now, cooler. "I don't."
"Really?" Kacey said. "I just figured, you know, omega social circles and all that..."
"I don't know anyone like that," Ren said again, and there was a firmness to it now that didn't match the sunshine persona at all.
Kacey should have stopped. He didn't.
"I mean, female omegas are just, well." He gestured vaguely, trying to summon the words that would make this normal, that would prove to himself and to Ren and to the alphas probably still watching them from the coffee shop that he was a beta who knew what he wanted. "They're soft, you know? And like, delicate. Plump in that really appealing way. Beautiful. Gorgeous, actually. I mean." He glanced at Ren, realized what he'd just implied, and course-corrected with all the grace of a man stumbling off a curb. "Not that male omegas aren't fine! Males are fine. You're fine. Great, even."
He gestured at Ren while he said it, a broad sweep of his hand that encompassed Ren's entire devastating outfit, and immediately regretted it because now he was visually acknowledging the crop top and the skirt and the thigh-highs and the way Ren's waist looked impossibly small above the pleated fabric.
Ren went quiet. Not the comfortable quiet of two people walking together, but the kind of quiet that had weight to it, like something fragile had just been set down between them and neither of them knew if it would break.
They reached the sandwich shop in silence. The interior was small and cramped, the kind of place that smelled like bread and vinegar and was always slightly too warm. Ren ordered a turkey avocado on wheat with a quiet politeness that didn't match his usual energy at all, and when the cashier rang it up, Kacey pulled out his wallet without thinking.
"I've got it," he said.
Ren looked at him, those green eyes wide again but different now, and his cheeks went pink. "You don't have to."
"It's fine," Kacey said, already handing over his card. "My idea to come with you, anyway."
The cashier was a beta. Kacey could tell by the lack of scent, the unremarkable features, the tired set of his shoulders that said he'd been on his feet for six hours and still had six to go. He took Kacey's card, ran it, and when he handed it back their eyes met for just a second.
It was the look. The one betas gave each other in moments like this. I see you, brother. I see exactly what's happening here. You are a walking wallet and this omega is going to smile and say thank you and you're going to pretend that's enough because what else are you going to do?
Kacey took his card back and pocketed it without a word. Just acknowledged the sentiment.
They waited by the counter for Ren's sandwich, standing too close because the space was too small, and Ren's arm brushed against Kacey's every time someone walked past them to the door. When the sandwich came up, Ren took it and smiled, and it was his real smile again, the one that crinkled the corners of his eyes.
"Thank you," he said, and there were too many syllables in it, like the words had weight.
"No problem," Kacey said.
They walked back to the office the same way they'd come. Ren stayed close, bumping his shoulder, but he didn't touch Kacey's wrist again. When they reached the building, Ren turned to him in the lobby and waved with the hand that wasn't holding his sandwich.
"See you later," he said, still smiling, and the sunshine was back in full force like the walk had never gone quiet at all.
"Yeah," Kacey said. "Later."
He watched Ren disappear toward the elevator, skirt swishing, and then turned and headed back to the lunch room.
The table had acquired more food in his absence. Jenny was now eating what looked like a protein bar with the enthusiasm of someone chewing cardboard. Jordan had pushed his tablet aside and was leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed. Alex was working his way through a sandwich that was so overstuffed with vegetables it was a structural miracle.
Kacey dropped into his chair and let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding.
"So?" Jenny said, not looking up from her protein bar. "How was your sandwich errand?"
"Fine," Kacey said. "Ren forgot his lunch. We went to the place on Fourth. I bought him a sandwich. It was fine."
"You paid again?" Jordan said, raising an eyebrow.
"It's not a big deal."
"It's never a big deal," Jenny said. "Until you add up how many times you've done it and realize you've basically been tithing to omegas."
"He's a nice guy," Kacey said, pulling out his own lunch of leftover pasta from last night that he'd packed in a container that was definitely not airtight enough because the smell was starting to announce itself. "He didn't want to walk alone."
"Omegas never want to do anything alone," Jordan said. "That's the whole scam. They're biologically wired to make people want to do things for them, and we're biologically wired to be too accommodating and polite to say no."
"Speak for yourself," Jenny said. "I say no constantly. Doesn't stop them from asking." Though, they all knew it was a lie.
"Did Marcus ask you to do something again?" Alex said, looking at Jenny with that gentle concern he always had, like he was perpetually worried someone at the table was about to snap.
"Marcus asked me to review the intern copy," Jenny said. "The omega intern copy. Which is bad. It's genuinely bad, Alex. But he asked me to review it 'gently' because apparently we need to 'nurture fresh talent.'" She made air quotes with the hand not holding the protein bar. "Meanwhile, I turned in my best work in months last week and got a thumbs-up emoji on Slack."
"A thumbs-up emoji," Jordan repeated, shaking his head. "Alpha Christ."
"It's fine," Jenny said. "I'm fine. I've accepted my role as the eternally unappreciated workhorse of this company. I'll just quietly build my portfolio until I can leverage it into a job somewhere that doesn't operate like a pheromone-based monarchy."
"Good luck finding that job," Jordan muttered.
"What about you?" Alex asked, turning to Jordan. "How's Ramona?"
Jordan's jaw tightened in a way that meant this was going to be good. "She gave me the Kinsella account."
There was a beat of silence.
"The Kinsella account," Jenny said slowly. "As in the Kinsella Hotel Group account that's worth like three million dollars."
"That one," Jordan said.
"Congratulations?" Alex tried.
"She's testing me," Jordan said, and there was something almost frantic in his voice now, like he'd been holding this in all morning and it was finally spilling out. "She's giving me the biggest account of my career to see if I crack. She rejected my pitch deck twice already this week! Twice, for a deck that I know was solid because I ran it past you guys and you said it was solid."
"It was very solid," Kacey confirmed.
"And then she tells me I'm getting Kinsella, which means she's setting me up to either prove myself or fail spectacularly in front of the entire leadership team." Jordan ran a hand through his hair, messing up the careful sweep he maintained. "I'm going back in tomorrow with data she can't argue with. I'm not giving her the satisfaction of watching me fold."
"Maybe she just thinks you're good at your job," Alex said.
Jordan stared at him. "She's an alpha, Alex. Alphas don't give betas three-million-dollar accounts because they think we're good at our jobs. They give them to us to see if we're good enough to justify the space we take up."
"That's bleak," Alex said.
"That's accurate," Jenny said. She balled up the protein bar wrapper and tossed it toward the trash can in the corner. It bounced off the rim and landed on the floor. She didn't get up to retrieve it. "You know what I realized this morning? The omega interns have been here three weeks. Three weeks. Marcus sent a company-wide email praising them for 'bringing fresh energy to the team.' I have been here four years. Four years of bringing energy that is apparently stale and unworthy of acknowledgment. But sure. Fresh energy. Love that for them."
"At least you got acknowledged," Jordan said. "Even if it was a thumbs-up emoji."
"A thumbs-up emoji is not acknowledgment. A thumbs-up emoji is what you send when you didn't actually read the thing but need to make it look like you did."
Jordan leaned back in his chair and exhaled. "You know what the worst part is? The absolute worst part?"
"Do tell," Jenny said.
"The worst part is that they don't even know they're doing it. The alphas, the omegas... they're just operating on instinct. They're not trying to make our lives harder. They're not sitting around plotting ways to make betas feel inadequate. They just… exist. And the world betas bend around them. And we're left picking up the pieces and pretending we're fine with it."
"We're the duct tape," Alex said, still chewing.
"What?"
"We're the duct tape of the ABO world," Alex said. "Unsexy but holding everything together."
Kacey snorted. Jenny cracked a smile despite herself. Jordan shook his head but he was almost grinning now too.
"Omegas nest, alphas posture, betas answer emails," Jenny said, pulling out her phone to add it to the group chat for posterity.
"No ruts, no heats, just deadlines," Jordan added.
"Born to grind, cursed to watch others get promoted for smelling nice," Kacey said, and they all nodded in solemn agreement.
The conversation drifted after that, looping back through familiar territory of the two-beta protocol when an omega went into heat at work, the way alphas ran companies like pheromone kingdoms, the heat leave and rut accommodations that betas never got equivalent time off for or pay compensation. It was comfortable. It was theirs. The same complaints aired every day at the same table with the same people, and there was something grounding about it, like a prayer or a mantra. We see it. We know. We're not crazy.
When lunch ended, they scraped their chairs back and threw away their trash except for Jenny, who left her protein bar wrapper on the floor as a small act of rebellion and headed back to their respective corners of the office.
Kacey made it to his desk, dropped his sketchbook on the surface, and had just woken his computer screen when a shadow fell across his keyboard.
He looked up.
Ren stood there, holding a tablet under one arm and doing that thing with his eyes again, the wide hopeful look that bypassed Kacey's brain and went straight to some deeply conditioned beta part of him that wanted to be helpful to omegas.
"Hi," Ren said. "Do you have a second?"
"Uh," Kacey said, glancing at his screen where approximately forty unread emails glared at him. "Sure. What's up?"
"I'm working on a display deck for the Northridge pitch," Ren said, "and I'm kind of stuck on the layout for the product imagery. I know you're good at spatial composition and I just… could you maybe look at it with me?"
Kacey should have said no. He had his own work. He had emails. He had a meeting in two hours that he hadn't prepped for. But Ren was looking at him with those green eyes and he'd just bought the guy a sandwich and saying no now felt weirdly petty.
"Yeah, okay," Kacey said, standing. "Where do you want to do this?"
"The collaborative couch?" Ren suggested, already turning toward the small lounge area near the windows where a sad two-seater sofa sat beneath a dying fiddle-leaf fig.
Kacey followed.
The couch was as uncomfortable as it looked, upholstered in some gray fabric that was supposed to look modern but mostly looked like it had been selected by someone who hated comfort. Ren sat down first, folding his legs beneath him in a way that made his skirt ride up slightly before he tugged it back down. Kacey sat next to him, leaving a respectful twelve inches of space between them.
Ren immediately scooted closer, closing the gap to about four inches, and angled his tablet so they were both looking at the screen.
The deck was actually pretty good. Ren had a solid eye for design with clean lines, good use of white space, a color palette that didn't make Kacey want to gouge his eyes out. But there was something off about the way the product shots were arranged, a rhythm problem that made the whole thing feel slightly unbalanced.
"See?" Ren said, pointing at the third slide. His arm crossed in front of Kacey's chest to reach the screen, "It feels crowded but I don't know why."
"It's the alignment," Kacey said, leaning in to get a better look. Their shoulders were touching now. "You've got the images staggered but the stagger isn't intentional enough. It looks like an accident instead of a choice. If you're going to offset them, commit to it. Make it a diagonal flow or a cascade. Right now it's just… off."
"Okay," Ren said, and he was close enough now that Kacey could feel the warmth of him against his side, a line of heat from shoulder to hip. "Show me?"
Kacey took the tablet. Their fingers brushed during the handoff and Ren didn't pull back, just let his hand linger near Kacey's for a beat longer than necessary before retreating.
For the next two hours, they worked. Ren would point at something, his bare arm crossing into Kacey's space, and Kacey would adjust it, narrating his thought process while Ren listened with a focus that felt almost too intense for a discussion about product placement. Every time Kacey made a joke... and he made several, because silence made him anxious and filling it with humor was a reflex Ren laughed, bright and genuine, like Kacey was the funniest beta person he'd ever met.
Their thighs were pressed together the entire time. Ren didn't move away. Kacey told himself it was because the couch was small.
By the time they finished, the deck looked legitimately good. Polished. Professional. The kind of thing that would make a client nod approvingly and say something like "strong visual identity."
"This is so much better," Ren said, scrolling through the revised slides with a grin that showed his teeth. "You're really good at this."
"It's just spatial logic," Kacey said, shrugging. "You did all the hard parts. I just moved some boxes around."
"You did more than that," Ren said, and he was looking at Kacey now instead of the screen, his green eyes bright and his expression softer than it had been all afternoon. "Thank you."
"No problem," Kacey said, and his voice came out rougher than he'd intended.
Ren's gaze flicked down to Kacey's mouth for a fraction of a second so fast Kacey convinced himself he'd imagined it.
"I should let you get back to work," Ren said, but he didn't move.
"Yeah," Kacey said. "I should… emails."
"Emails," Ren agreed, smiling.
They stood at the same time, too close in the small space between the couch and the coffee table, and for a moment they just looked at each other. Ren's hair was slightly mussed from where he'd tucked it behind his ear and it had fallen forward again. His cheeks were still a little pink. He looked....
Kacey turned away before he could finish the thought.
"See you tomorrow," he said, heading back toward his desk without waiting for a response.
His ears were burning. He could feel them, hot and red and betraying him the way they always did when something made him flustered. He sat down at his desk, woke his computer screen, and stared at his emails without reading a single word.
His side still felt warm where Ren had been pressed against him.
He opened the group chat and typed: Ren just made me help him with a deck for two hours. My thighs are asleep. Why am I like this.
Jenny replied immediately: Because you're a beta and you're biologically incapable of saying no to people. It's fine. We're all like this.
Jordan: Did he at least credit you when he presents it?
Kacey: It's his deck. I just moved some stuff around.
Alex: That's nice of you.
Kacey stared at the screen. He should have said something else. Something funnier. Something that would deflect the weird uncomfortable feeling sitting in his chest like a stone. Instead he locked his phone and went back to his emails.