Chapter Text
He manages to land himself in the hospital on Tuesday.
When he wakes, Ohata-san is leaning over him, placing something at his side carefully. A groan escapes him. Her eyes dart to him.
“Hozumi-kun!” she gasps.
“What happened?” he croaks, blinking.
“You don’t remember?”
He starts to sit up but she rushes to his side, grabbing his arm to help. The hospital sheets feel scratchy against his skin, uncomfortable in a way that’s new to him, and he grimaces.
“You collapsed during the preliminary meeting this morning. You know,” she says, “with Murasans?”
Yutaka’s eyebrows raise. “The new starter company?”
She nods and Yutaka positively flushes. He’ll never be able to live that down.
“Everyone understands though,” she says, as if reading his mind. “The doctor said it could have been worse.”
Worse? “What’s wrong with me?”
Ohata-san shakes her head. “She didn’t tell us, but—” Her eyes light up. “Wait here. I can go get her.”
She’s halfway out the door when Yutaka spies the tupperware at his side.
“What’s this?” he asks, eying it.
“Oh! A young man with blonde hair dropped by with this, but you were sleep. He was insistent on waiting, but the doctor sent him home. Apparently, the hospital’s swamped with visitors as it is. I wouldn’t have been allowed to stay either if it hadn’t been for OST needing a representative to report back on you.”
She slips out but Yutaka can hardly pay attention. Sent Minoru away? He glances out the window, noting the setting sun disappearing behind the sea of skyscrapers. I’ve missed dinner with them.
There’s a knock at the door. He looks up as an older woman in a white coat walks in, a clipboard in hand.
“So,” she says, “I hear you’re finally awake.”
“What happened?”
“You fainted,” she replies simply, “largely because of those suppressants you’re taking." She takes a seat on the rolling stool at his side. "Hozumi-san, do you know the dosage levels on that medication?”
“I…was told it was safe for consumption.”
“Periodically, yes, but not as you’ve been taking them. Not regularly.” She flips through a few papers on her clipboard. “Yes, they’re blocking your omegic hormones from regulating now.” She flips another page and whistles. “I haven’t seen levels this low since the 90s. It’ll be imperative that you come off them.”
Yutaka’s lips part. “But I’ve…never been off of them.”
“And that’s exactly the problem. Suppressants are for particularly potent days. Heats, post-ops, all of that. They are not meant to block out what makes you omega.”
He never meant to do that. It’s not that he minds being an omega. It doesn’t impact his life all that much. He just doesn’t like the noise that comes with it. How everything feels so heightened. Feelings and such.
“Your contact levels are particularly abysmal.”
“Con—Contact…?”
“Physical touch. Affection,” she translates, “and a quick look at your chart says they’ve been that way for quite some time. At least twelve years. I’m surprised your physician never warned you of the dangers of that.”
“He…did,” Yutaka replies. “I just didn’t think it was that serious.”
“It is. People can die from it. It’s rare, but it happens.”
Yutaka’s fingers tighten around the sheet. “So, you’re taking me off my suppressants..?”
“No, that’s entirely your choice,” she says. “I can only advise you against taking them.”
Yutaka chews on his lips.
“There are alternatives,” she offers. “I can refer you to some service programs; they’re designed to pair you with a temporary partner without the constraints of a bond. My recommendation would be that you choose an alpha, but that’s also your choice.”
“An alpha?”
“They’re known for increasing contact hormones at a faster rate.” She smirks. “Despite some strands of thought, they’re actually the ones who latch on quicker relationally than any other designation.”
He says nothing if only because he doesn’t know what to say.
The doctor must infer as much because she smiles tightly and says: “I’ll give you some time to think about it. For now, though...” She sets something down on his side table before leaving.
He glances at them after several minutes. Leaflets. A service program pairing though? And with someone he’s never met? He’d rather die. Then again, that’s exactly what the doctor said might happen to him if he doesn’t come off the suppressants; but a pairing, even without a bond, involves affection, touching, scenting.
The last time he remembers being scented, he’d been in his parents’ house. He can count on one hand how many times they had scented him throughout his childhood. We do not wish to erase the memory of your biological parents, they’d said. It had been considerate of them. Kind, even. Who could have known that time, not touch, would erase his biological parents’ scent? They couldn’t have known, but should they have, would Yutaka even have begged them to scent him? After all, he was the one who went on suppressants while too young and too ignorant and with a dose far too high. He knew the risks and for what? Because he hadn't wanted to feel lonely?
Yutaka swallows and opens the tupperware. Curry, he recognizes, falling back on the bed. He was supposed to have made that.
Tane and Minoru do visit the next day during visitors’ hours ("My father had to teach a class but he sends his regards," Minoru says later) and Tane practically launches himself onto the bed, falling into his arms sobbing.
“Yukata…” he wails.
Minoru stands in the door wordlessly. He offers Yutaka a smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes and it strikes Yutaka when the last time either of them had visited a hospital was and his face goes cold.
“Sorry,” Yutaka says, stroking Tane’s head but he says it loud enough for both of them. “For frightening you. I’m sorry.”
They discharge him two days later and Tane elects that the event calls for a celebration, namely snacks from the convenience store.
“I want this one,” Tane says, dropping a Choco cake into the basket. “And these!” He throws in mini chocolates and a melon pan.
“The celebration is for Yutaka, not you,” Minoru chastens, removing two out of the three items.
“Aww,” Tane whines.
“What do you mean ‘aww?’ You’re lucky I’m buying you anything at all, you little…”
Yutaka smiles silently, watching as they gripe back and forth. It’s only when they’re at the checkout, after Tane has taken off to check out the toy display that Minoru addresses him.
“You sure you’re alright?” he asks.
Yutaka nods. “Mm.”
“They said you fainted.” He says it offhandedly, but his jaw is clenched and his eyes are young. Visibly afraid.
“I’m okay,” Yutaka insists, apologetic all over again. “The doctor confirmed it.”
“Good.” Minoru nods stiffly. “That’s…good.”
Minoru takes out his wallet to pay, seemingly reassured for the time being, but Yutaka cannot be. He hadn’t thought much about the drawbacks of the medication when he’d first taken it. He hadn't known Tane and Minoru then. But he hadn’t even thought much of waking up in the hospital either, and that is his fault. He should have known that this would worry them. That neither of them would brush his hospital visit off so lightly. They lost a mother and for a second, surely they’d thought they’d lose him too.
I’ll sign up for the services, he thinks after they leave the store, watching as Minoru bids Tane to hold his hand as they cross the street. I’ll sign up. If only for their sakes.
“They say I’ll need an alpha," he confesses the following week.
Minoru chokes on his rice ball so loudly it draws the attention of passerbys in the park. “An alpha?”
Yutaka nods, inching further back on the bench. “Sorry,” he says. “It seems I’ve been reckless. My dosage of suppressants is too high. Was too high. If I don’t come off of them, they say I could…It could be bad.” He sighs without meaning to. “The only trouble is…I don’t do well without them.”
“Don’t do well in what way?”
He digs his knees together. “I get…over-stimulated is the best word for it. My physician thinks it’s something that developed when I was a child.” Not enough comforting, they had said but he won’t say that aloud. Instead he says: “I might have been innately insecure. In need of more reassurance than most children.”
“You mean, you needed to be scented more?”
Yutaka digs his fingernails into his palms. “Maybe. I…didn’t know that it was so important, to be honest. Scenting and nesting and things. I didn’t know.”
But he should have. It’s so obvious, especially now that he’s seen Tane with Minoru. Tane is precocious and extroverted and fiercely independent, but he also seeks out Minoru’s touch whenever he can get it. And he’s received. That matters.
“You must have sought it out as a child,” Minoru says and it’s kind of him, to defend him in such a way.
“Not well enough, it seems.”
He smiles apologetically, but Minoru isn’t smiling and that makes him drop his head, clear his throat, look anywhere else but at him.
“So, an alpha then…?”
Yutaka hums in confirmation. “A beta or another omega would work normally, but my contact levels are too low.”
Silence passes between them and for a second, Yutaka is certain it will be interrupted by Tane yelling ‘Yukata, Yukata!’ Then, he remembers where they are: it’s noon, on a Monday, and Tane is at school.
“There are services.”
“What?” Yutaka startles. “Oh, um. Y-Yes.” He nods. “There are.”
“Better ones than before.”
“Mm.”
“If you need help. That is, vetting one. I could help find…” Minoru offers, but his voice is strained, edged to a point.
“Thank you.” Yutaka ducks his head, offering a small smile. “It would be an imposition though, wouldn’t it?”
“Why would it be?”
“Wouldn’t Tane-kun be uncomfortable? My scent, too, wouldn’t be the same, especially if I’m wearing an alpha’s scent.”
Minoru doesn’t respond. He only leans back on the bench, tensing his jaw.
Yutaka clutches the remaining half of his own rice ball tight. “Sorry.”
“Eh?”
“I don’t mean to drag you into my problems. That wasn’t my intention.”
A strange look passes through Minoru’s eyes. “Yutaka,” he says. “When I said I would help, I meant it.”
He doesn’t know why that causes his eyes to sting, but he drops his head anyway just in case Minoru notices. He’s thought it once before, then many times after, that Minoru is good. Not just as an alpha, or even as a brother or son, but as a man. Who would take a break from university just to care for their family? Surely, not someone so young and promising. He’s seen the plaques in Minoru’s home. He knows Minoru wasn’t just good but great in school. He held promise. Yet, he’s here: sitting on a park bench in the windchill, waiting for Tane to get out of school, and in the meantime, he’s listening to…
Yutaka sniffs. “Thank you,” he says.
“Mm.” Minoru nods.
He ends up selecting a service site called Paired.
The site presents him with a catalog of traits, heights, occupations, hairstyles, even shoe color and Yutaka exits out, overwhelmed and minimally contented that he at least looked for the day. He only opens it again several days later when it’s late at night and he’s feeling particularly courageous.
Eventually, he makes an account, adding the only photo of himself he has, and hits ‘create.’ Within hours, his inbox is flooded but the messages are all the same. His prospects call him ‘handsome,’ ‘pretty,’ ‘cute’ and Yutaka feels nothing at all.
Minoru asks him how the alpha search is going one day while Tane plays ‘zoo’ and Yutaka struggles to come up with a word for it.
“Um, fine,” he settles on.
“Just fine?”
“Mm.” He nods.
Minoru’s eyes wander away. “Has…anyone caught your attention?”
“My attention?”
“Yeah. Is anyone pleasing to you?”
Yutaka frowns, confused. To be fair, he’s never really understood attraction. That is, he’s never thought about what would attract him or what is attractive to him. He can’t remember having any crushes or being interested in anyone before, and it’s the same now. They are people on a screen. Pictures without real faces, names without voices, and it’s hard to imagine them real. But that still leaves the penultimate question: what do I want then?
If he had to think about it, he supposes he would like someone considerate. Someone kind. Perhaps, that is too plain, too ordinary, but he has already known extravagant things. He knows a swift adoption. All the clothes one could ever ask for. Porcelain plates and pressed linens. Fugu and delicately seasoned wagyu. That’s all familiar. But to be thought of and remembered? To be welcomed? To be seen?
All the money in the world couldn't buy that.
Tane roars, effectively snapping Yutaka out of his reverie.
“Yukata!” he calls. “Look at me!”
He leaps over a bean bag that’s been turned into an African brush, tackling a mock-gazelle to the floor.
Yutaka laughs. “Did you see that?” he says, turning to Minoru but Minoru is already looking at him.
“Yeah,” he says, staring. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
“You said you need an alpha,” Minoru says one evening while walking him home. He’s wearing a green bomber jacket, held together by safety pins on the side, and ripped jeans that make him look young and reckless. Impossibly younger than twenty-three. “I was thinking…” He clears his throat. “I could be… That is, perhaps I could be your…?”
Yutaka’s eyebrows raise. Oh. Oh. “Uh…” He looks away.
“Oh.” Minoru nods, sniffs, shoves his hands so deep in his pockets that Yutaka winces. “Of course. Yeah.”
“I don’t mean to say…That is, you are—”
“Yutaka, it’s more than alright.”
He keeps walking, but Yutaka hardly can. There are things he’s better at than words, better still than conversation, and this proves it. But he can’t have Minoru thinking that he’d be a bad choice. That Yutaka thinks he’s… It’s really not that.
“I don’t want to take advantage.”
Minoru stills, then turns. “What?”
Yutaka looks away. “I said it before. You’re like your mother. You try to cheer people up, but you also…you’re taking care of Tane-kun and your father. You’re working and now, you’re willing to…Now, you would…” He shakes his head. “I couldn’t.”
“Yutaka…”
He can’t look at him. Minoru can try to convince him otherwise but they both know the truth. Minoru is only twenty-three and, yes, although Yutaka is as well, it’s not the same as being twenty-three and carrying an entire household. It is not the same as raising a child, even if he is your brother.
When he finally looks up, Minoru is in front of him, staring with eyes fixed and intense.
“Would you have asked me?”
“What?”
“Would you have asked me?” Minoru says again. “If you hadn’t thought that I… Would you have asked?”
He swallows, trying to find the words, but they are lodged somewhere in his throat.
“Is that why you were considering alpha services?” Minoru keeps on. “So, you wouldn’t burden me?”
“You’re…my friend.”
“Is that a ‘yes’?”
He fidgets then nods, looking elsewhere. “Mm.”
The street is quiet between them. There are no cars this late at night. There are only the stars blinking down upon them like a voyeur, and it strikes Yutaka only then how private, how explicit, all of this is.
“What if…you could offer something too?”
“What?”
“If you came and cooked our meals in between your work hours, it could be mutual that way.”
“I don’t think—”
“And Tane would like it. He asks about you. All the time. Everyday.”
Yutaka clasps his wrist wordlessly, digging his nail into the skin.
“It wouldn’t be a burden,” Minoru presses on relentlessly. “It wouldn’t.”
That is easy to say, but surely it would be. He must say as much. He must.
“I…” He swallows. The nail is practically stabbing his skin now. “It wouldn’t be as you’d expect. That is, I wouldn’t…” He bites his lip. “I wouldn’t be reliable. Everything is unpredictable. As far as omegas go, I’m not…” Average? Typical? Normal? Good?
“Yutaka,” Minoru says, “having you here is enough.”
Is it? That is a strange thought. He knows what it is to have enough, to have more than enough really, but to be such a thing? Is that even possible?
“So, what would I need to do?” Minoru asks, clearing his throat.
“It would, um, be fairly straightforward. We’re just supposed to…trick my hormones into thinking that we’re, uh,…that we’re…”
“Mated?”
He nods. “The doctor said it’s the security of the matter.”
“But there’s no need for a bond mark?”
“No,” he says then smiling weakly. “Just some affection. It seems my needs aren’t so lofty.”
Minoru frowns, disturbed clearly by something that Yutaka can’t make out. Surely, it’s a good thing that he isn’t too needy.
“Can I scent you now?”
Yutaka’s eyebrows fly up. “Here?”
“If…that is okay with you,” he probes hesitantly. “I’m afraid Tane would interrupt us. Or my father. He definitely would. Besides, it’s too late for anyone to be out roaming here anyway.”
We are, he thinks but doesn’t say aloud. Instead, he just nods.
“Then, if you will…” Minoru gestures.
“Oh! Yes, um…Where would you like to…?”
“Your neck.”
Yutaka startles. “My—?”
“I could scent your wrist but pairs don’t usually do that.”
“Ah, yes, of course.” Yutaka angles his head to the side, exposing his neck. “Is this okay?”
“Perhaps, the scarf…”
“It’s in the way?”
“Not at all. That is, if you’re cold—”
“I’m not,” he lies before he knows it is a lie. “Well, not really.”
“Mm.” Minoru rocks on his feet silently for a moment. “You can keep it on if you’d be more comfortable, but…my scent will stick better if your neck is…”
“Bare?”
Minoru nods once, stiff and pale in the winter night but cheeks pink. It is cold but, strangely, Yutaka feels hot and unsteady as if caught within a fever dream. Clumsily, he unties the scarf, leaving it hanging around his shoulders. He unzips the top of his coat, only to the collarbone but the chill seeps in regardless, drawing a hiss out of him.
Minoru draws close —too close— within a breath. “I’ll be quick.”
“I’m not worried about you.” Yutaka smiles, trying to manage something lighthearted and unaffected, but his whole body is trembling now. Untethered and his no longer. “It’s been so long that I…” He laughs, suddenly shamed. “Well, I’m afraid my legs might give out.”
“May I…?”
Yutaka blinks. “Eh?”
An arm slides around his waist.
“M-Minoru…?” He jolts.
“I have you,” Minoru says lowly. “If that happens, I’ll have you.”
He nods. “Mm.”
“Now,” Minoru’s eyes flick to his neck. “If I could…?”
“Please.” He didn’t mean to say that. You may. Yes. Of course. That’s what he meant to say. Not—
Minoru’s nose brushes against his neck and Yutaka’s brain short-circuits. His cheek is so warm, he thinks distantly, and his scent is…Minoru doesn’t smell of cologne like the salarymen Yutaka works with nor of aftershave. It’s food. His scent is braised and salted, caught between dried nori and ramen broth, and sweetened only at the edges. The first hint of it should be a trauma, but then Yutaka inhales and it is akin to that first bite of a good meal. It isn’t expensive but nor is it lonely. It is memory; of a “magic meal” and an over-salted rice ball; a bowl of softly-boiled udon and yuzu; something clumsy and overburnt and he shouldn’t be surprised that Minoru’s scent is him. Is everything he has ever done.
Minoru’s lips brush just beneath his ear and, at that moment, Yutaka’s legs do give out.
“S-Sorry,” he says as Minoru’s arm tightens around him, keeping him steady.
Minoru’s eyes flick to him. “There’s nothing to apologize for.” But his voice is several pitches too low and rough, as if serrated by a knife, and the arm around Yutaka’s waist is tight enough to bruise.
“I…should have washed up,” Yutaka says half-by-way-of-apology because it’s been a long day and god knows what he smells like now. “The doctor said my scent might be too strong.”
“It’s more than fine,” he replies.
Yutaka highly doubts that. His adopted parents never scented him like this. No one has ever scented him like this. As if to prove it, Minoru’s nose drags up the length of his neck, rubbing his scent in there. It’s not a claim, but there is no way Yutaka will be looked upon as single any longer. Not smelling like this. He smells like he’s spoken for now. Like he’s being courted. Like he’s Minoru’s.
The thought goes straight to his cock, eliciting a twitch and Yutaka colors. That’s…new.
“Too much?” Minoru’s voice is a tremor across his skin, a vibration, a quake.
“No, it’s…it’s…” He searches for the word. Good. Fantastic. Lovely. “Fine.”
“And you?”
“M-Me?”
Minoru leans back, staring at him now. “Do you feel any better?”
His mouth opens and closes. There is no answer or simple word to describe it. He has always been anxious by nature, perhaps a bit too shy and a little too easily startled for his own good, but at this moment, he feels more than that. Simultaneously stable and unstable all at once, half-hard and on the verge of leaking, and that’s never happened. With anyone.
Minoru takes a step back and Yutaka has no explanation for why that causes him to grab onto his jacket. Minoru’s eyes widen.
“Uh, sorry,” Yutaka says, releasing him as if burned.
“I…wasn’t going to go anywhere.”
“No, it’s better if—” He clasps his own wrist. “Sorry.”
He can feel Minoru’s eyes on him, staring at him for a stretch of time that feels more like a re-assessment than a consideration. At least, that is what it must be. Maybe, he’s regretting this. Yutaka could hardly blame him. He’s not exactly—
“Will you be okay?”
Yutaka jolts. “Eh?”
“At your job, that is.” Minoru clarifies further: “There are policies in some places against scents, right?”
“Oh, uh…Not at mine, but I have a medical note.” He re-ties his scarf then and zips up his coat which, somehow, manages to lock Minoru’s scent permanently inside his clothes. He wavers on his feet for a second, head swimming. “And you…?” he croaks.
“What?”
“Will you be okay at yours?”
“Oh, yeah.” Minoru laughs suddenly, scratching his head. “In fact, I’m sure my boss will have a field day. He’s been badgering me about loosening up. Going out more. Having someone.” His eyes widen. “That’s not to say—”
“But it’s true, right? For the time being, I…would be…yours?”
“Mm.” Minoru nods, face flushed. “I would be too. Yours, that is.”
They stand side-by-side silently and it strikes Yutaka that it has always been like this between them. These stretches of quiet… They are not uncomfortable.
“I’ll be in your care,” he hears Minoru mumble soft and low.
Yutaka bunches his hands in his coat pockets and nods, suddenly warmer than he came.
He expects things to change between them, but they don’t. Not really.
He still goes over Minoru’s and they still meet at the park sometimes. He makes more food now, sure, but everything is still the same between them. At least, he thinks as much until they end up in the kitchen one weekend, preparing a gohan.
Yutaka is laying out the vegetables when he frowns and calls out toward the sitting room: “Minoru, can you check the grocery bag? I think I left the burdock.”
There’s a shuffle on the other side, then the door slides open and Minoru appears with the root already in hand.
"Tane was playing with it." He rolls his eyes.
Yutaka laughs. “Thanks."
“No problem,” Minoru replies, shoulder bumping into his when he deposits it onto the cutting board.
“Oh!” Yutaka turns. “Can you check on the rice on your way out?”
Minoru nods, brushing by him again to check the cooker. That’s strange. He’s never known Minoru to be clumsy.
But Minoru does it again during dinner, brushing against him while reaching for the rice bowl, then while Tane is playing and Yutaka is at a loss for words. He gets up the courage to ask after Tane disappears for his nightly bath.
“Minoru?” he inquires.
“Hm?”
“Why do you keep—” He loses confidence, forces himself to gain it again. “Do you mean to keep bumping into me?”
“Huh?”
“You keep…knocking into me.”
Minoru’s eyes widen. He looks away, rubbing the back of his head. “…arking,” Yutaka hears.
“What?”
“I’m, uh, marking you.”
“You’re—?” He startles. “Oh.”
“I can stop,” he says swiftly.
“No, it’s—it’s fine.”
“I just thought…” Minoru’s face is properly red now and Yutaka feels the urge to apologize for playing a hand in embarrassing him. “You said we needed to act like a pair, so…”
He nods, but for some reason, he hadn’t thought of this. Or, rather, he hadn’t thought that Minoru would want to mark him. His parents barely did that. So, why would he…? But the thought of it plants itself in his mind regardless. The thought that Minoru has been walking around, communicating ‘mine, mine mine,’ all day and so gently that Yutaka never even imagined…
He swallows, smiles. “It’s fine.”
Some Saturdays Minoru works.
It’s shorter hours, only ten to two and, on those days, Yutaka still comes by the house to play with Tane. This Saturday, Minoru is a blur of activity, apologizing before rushing out. It’s only an hour later when Yutaka realizes that he’s left his bento on the counter.
He tells as much to Ueda-san.
“I say let him starve. Serves him right for oversleeping,” Ueda-san says with a mirthful glint in his eye. “But you can take it to him, if you want.”
Yutaka’s eyes widen. “Take it…to…?”
“Of course.” Ueda-san beckons him outside and points to the street. “Just travel up until you reach the fork in the road, then head left. You’ll see an old ramen shop. Big red sign. Can’t miss it.”
“I…wouldn’t want to intrude.”
“Bah!” He waves a dismissive hand. “You? Intrude? He ought to be grateful. I wouldn’t do it.” He walks away chuckling, leaving Yutaka standing in the front with the bento in hand.
He’s never visited Minoru where he works, but neither has Minoru ever visited him either. It’s not a rule. It’s just…never happened. Ueda-san made it seem like it wouldn’t be a big deal to drop by, but Yutaka isn’t so sure. He wouldn’t want to distract Minoru.
He glances back down at the bento. He’d only be dropping it off, not staying. That should be okay. With that thought, he ventures up the hill, going left at the fork until he finds himself wandering up to a small ramen shop. It’s empty when he enters. Too early for customers then.
He’s considering leaving the bento on a table when a curtain, leading to the back, opens and an older man in a white headcovering steps out.
“Uh, excuse me,” Yutaka says, bowing. He fiddles with the bento. “I…”
The man takes one look at him and muses: “Ah, I know who you are… One second.” He turns and calls: “Minoru-kun! Get out here!”
There’s a shuffle from the back. “Whaat?” Minoru’s voice calls back. “You just told me to unload the truck. Can it wait?”
“Sure.” The man —Minoru’s boss, surely— rolls out, smiling at Yutaka. “Your omega just came to see you, is all.”
Yutaka startles, flushing, but he barely has a chance to sit with his own embarrassment when he hears something topple from the back. There’s the sound of feet almost running, then the curtain whips open.
Minoru stumbles in, breathless. “Yutaka?”
“You, uh, forgot your lunch,” he says, blanching after hearing just how that sounded. He’s not a housewife. “I mean—”
“Goodness, you’re a life saver,” Minoru breathes, taking the bento from him. “I’d have had to eat here.”
“And what’s wrong with my ramen?” Minoru’s boss says, and Yutaka almost forgot he was there.
“You mean, the fact that you always take it out of my paycheck?”
“Should I take it out of your hours?”
Minoru makes a face. “Alright, alright. I get it.”
Minoru’s boss looks at Yutaka. “He’s a right complainer, your alpha.”
“Hey!”
They start up arguing and Yutaka is too rapt to say anything. My…alpha? Of course, that’s what they agreed to on paper, but he hadn’t thought about other people recognizing that. He doesn't know how he feels about it, only that his lips are twisting together, presently fighting an unruly smile.
Minoru presents him with a bag, stuffed to the point of bursting, the next day. “Here,” he says, holding it out. “For you.”
Yutaka takes the handle gingerly. He peers inside. Stacks of folded sweatshirts and hoodies —that aren’t particularly his style— stare back up at him.
“This is…for…me?”
“Yes. I mean, no. That is…” Minoru rubs the back of his head, looking elsewhere. “They’re…for your nest.”
“For my…?” Yutaka flushes.
He looks back down at the clothes and spies camouflage. That’s his jacket. Yutaka’s eyes widen. These are Minoru’s—? “O-Oh.”
“You don’t have to use them,” Minoru says swiftly. “It’s just an idea.”
Yutaka swallows, staring at the bag once more.
“They aren’t washed. Not that they smell or anything!” he adds quickly. “They just smell like…” The ‘me’ hangs in the air, unspoken.
“Thank you.”
Minoru shoves his hands in his pockets, blushing. “Like I said, you don’t have to use them.”
He wants to though and he does, later that evening. Yutaka doesn’t know what constitutes as a nest, but he figures adding a sweatshirt or two between his bedding is suitable enough. He flicks off the light, climbs in, and drags a hoodie tentatively to his face.
Heat instantly courses through him, liquifying the tension out of his body. He doesn’t know if all scents have this effect. They’ve been largely dulled out for now, but Minoru’s is good. More than that, even. It’s a feast to the senses, a dining table, and surely, it deserves more than being smushed between a pair of old sheets.
Yutaka grabs his phone and brings up the search engine. In the dark, he types: How to build a nest for the first time.
His brother texts him on Monday. When are you coming home? Mom is asking after you. He looks at it. Types out a response. Deletes it. Promises to respond tomorrow.
He responds on Friday: Sorry. Work has been busy.
Yuki’s reply is terse: You’re an omega. You’re supposed to be about family.
It’s not the first time he’s said those words. Yutaka knows he’s just angry. Yuki doesn’t know what he’s saying. He wouldn’t. Those words are merely an assumption, a perception, a stereotype, and it has nothing to do with him. Yet, he cannot help the way the words lodge themselves inside his chest anyway, frozen there.
Yutaka goes by Minoru’s in the evening because he promised. His hands are folded tight in his lap when Minoru returns to the sitting room after dinner with a cup of tea.
“I didn’t know what tea you like,” he says. “We only had green.”
“Mm.” Yutaka nods, ducking his head, taking it.
Minoru sits, bringing them face-to-face now, and Yutaka can hardly bear it. He looks away.
The clock is ticking in the silence and Yutaka can feel himself sweating. Should I touch him? Scent him? Greet him another way? Wait, did I even greet him? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know what omegas are supposed to do when paired and, perhaps, that is the problem and that is Yuki’s point. He’s so clueless as to the way of things and he shouldn’t be. He’s twenty-three years old already and he should know. He’s twenty-three years old and he should know better.
“Yutaka?”
He sniffs. “Mm?”
“Are you…” Minoru angles for his attention, for his eyes, and he’s not used to that. “Are you okay?”
His fingernails bite into his palms. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
“It’s just—You seem down.”
He looks at Minoru then, really looks, and finds his brow furrowed and eyes searching.
Yutaka swallows. “I—”
“Yukata!”
Tane runs in, hair wet and smelling of soap, and barrels right into him.
“Oi, Tane! Careful!” Minoru chastens, sucking his teeth. “You’ll hurt him like that.”
Yutaka smiles weakly. “It’s okay—”
“No, I won’t,” Tane smarts then grins back at him. It falls within a second. “Yukata…” he says, wrinkling his nose. “You smell funny.”
Minoru colors. “Oi! Tane—!”
“What? You smell it too, right?”
“We don’t say that. It’s rude,” he says, dragging Tane away. Minoru’s eyes meet his for a moment and dart away just as fast. So, he thinks so too…
“But it’s true,” Tane whines, wiggling out from under Minoru’s arms. He bounds back over to Yutaka. “You smell like…bad rice. Like nii-chan’s old rice balls.”
“Tane!”
The kitchen door slides open and Ueda-san appears. He freezes at the entrance, sniffing.
“What is that god-awful smell?”
Yutaka flushes, and Minoru releases a groan.
Tane jumps up and down. “See?”
“Yukata-kun,” Ueda-san says, bending down to pick up Tane, “whatever my son has done, just know: we like you more.”
“Don’t butt into other people’s business,” Minoru gripes. “It’s not like that.”
Ueda-san pays him no mind. “Forgive him,” he says to Yutaka. “He’s a fool.”
“Alright, alright.” Minoru waves a hand. “Get out of here.”
Ueda-san sucks his teeth at him but otherwise takes a waving Tane out of the room and slides the door behind them.
“Sorry about that,” Minoru says, scratching his head.
Yutaka cannot manage so much as nod though. He’s struck by the thought that, this entire time, he’s smelled…bitter, possibly forlorn, shamed definitely and Minoru only asked after him, fought for his gaze, but never exposed him. He probably never would have even said anything had Tane not burst in. That’s more than kind. That’s…
“My brother messaged me.”
He feels more than sees Minoru’s head snap up. “Did he?” he says after a stretch. His voice is strangely clipped. “What’d he say?”
He gathers his sleeves around his hands, hiding them. He bites his lip.
“Yutaka.”
He looks up.
“What did he say to you?”
“Nothing bad. Just that our mother misses me.”
A beat. “That’s all he said?”
Yutaka picks at a string on his sleeve, pulling it. “My brother—” He clears his throat. “I mean, my parents…They’ve always thought my brother has a complex about omegas. I don’t think that. He doesn’t. He just…can’t understand me and I don’t blame him for that. I’m not—” The string unravels in his hand, limp. “There are so many things, simple things, that I should know but don’t. Like how to scent someone. Or where to scent them. Or how to nest. Contact, even. I suppressed everything and now I…”
He swallows. Minoru sits silently, motionless.
“Omegas are supposed to be about family,” he quotes. “That’s what he said, and I haven’t been about mine. I’ve been afraid of mine and I shouldn’t be.”
His eyes are stinging, close to swimming now and he wipes them with his sleeve, sniffling.
“Can I scent you?”
Yutaka’s head snaps up. “What?”
“I’d like to scent you,” Minoru asks again, voice thick. “If it’s okay with you, I’d like to…Please,” he croaks.
“Yes, of course. Um, I’ll just…”
He gets up and sits before him.
“My lap,” Minoru says. “I think it’d be easier if you…Our current position is too awkward this way, I think.”
“Ah, yes.” He rises and places a steadying hand on Minoru’s shoulder. “I-If you’ll permit me…” he excuses and then, climbs onto Minoru’s crossed legs.
His weight settles and a twitch jolts his entire body.
“You okay?” Minoru asks.
Yutaka nods, looking away from him. “Just…” Over-sensitive, he won’t admit out loud.
He startles when a hand snakes its way around his waist and another settles on the back of his head. Both draw him closer in.
“Come.”
He’s surprised by how willingly he goes, how easy it is to tilt his head just so, how eager he is for Minoru to—to—
Minoru breathes into his neck, pushing his scent in and almost instantly, Yutaka goes completely boneless.
“Feel that?” Minoru asks, a murmur.
He doesn’t trust his voice. “Mm.”
“Scenting isn’t just for creating closeness or affection, you know. It’s also about safety. About letting you know that you’re safe and that someone's got you.”
Fingers drag down his spine and Yutaka positively arches into it.
“M…Minoru.”
“Do you want me to stop?” he asks, pausing.
Yutaka stills, only realizing then that his hands are shaking, clutched tight around Minoru’s hoodie.
“No,” he murmurs, ducking his head. “Please. Don’t stop.”
Minoru nods and resumes rubbing his face into his neck. Yutaka teeters, a haze-like cloud settling over his mind but not completely. He can hardly relax fully, not sitting as close as this, not when he keeps taking from Minoru like this.
“I…don’t want to impose,” he confesses.
“I’m the one who offered myself to you.”
“But you’re the one scenting me again. I-I haven’t…”
“It’s not like that,” Minoru says, his voice a vibration against his skin. “Scenting is just as comforting for the person who gives it.”
“You need comfort?”
Minoru stills against him. Yutaka can’t see his face though, only the pink of his ears.
“You were upset,” he says simply.
Yutaka blinks, unsure what that has to do with anything. He’s about to say as much when Minoru’s nose brushes under his ear, causing him to jolt in his lap, suddenly wired.
“I’ve noticed,” Minoru murmurs, “you’re sensitive here.”
It’s probably only meant to be an observation, a passing comment, but it makes something in Yutaka’s stomach flip. Minoru brushes the spot again.
“Unh!” he whines.
Minoru goes rigid and Yutaka could hide under a rock right now if it were possible.
He flushes and pushes his glasses up. “Sor—”
Lips latch onto the spot under his ear and it’s like lightning hit his nervous system. Distantly, he can feel his hands digging into Minoru’s shoulders, can smell Minoru’s scent thicken and plume-like steam released from a pot’s top, can hear himself moaning, rocking now as if to chase the feeling and he’s hard. Harder than he’s ever been.
He scoots in closer and accidentally brushes the front of Minoru’s jeans, drawing a strangled groan out of him. Yutaka’s eyes widen. He’s—!
The door slides open and Yutaka practically launches himself out of Minoru’s lap.
“Yukata! You have to see my fort. Hurry! Hurry!”
“O-Of course,” he says, breathless, trying to find the most inconspicuous way of adjusting himself. When he rises, though, the back of his pants come away damp.
Minoru sucks in a breath.
“Your fort,” Yutaka bursts out. “Um, where is it?”
“This way!” Tane says, taking off out the room and down the hall.
He starts after him, freezes, then bows nonsensically to Minoru. “Uh, if you’ll excuse me. I have to go, um—” and takes off.