by Aiden Bates
Oliver’s voice broke. I could tell he was close to tears, but he took a steadying breath, and then glanced at me. I sank down on the other side of him, my legs not quite up to the task of keeping me upright as I dazedly absorbed everything he said.
“You never told me.” I shook my head. I knew Oliver was a private person and revealed things in his own time. Still, this seemed like a pretty fucking big oversight.
“I know, Mitch, and I’m sorry. It’s difficult, you know? It’s a lot to burden anyone with.”
I scoffed. “Not a burden, you idiot.”
“It’s also a burden to talk about,” Oliver said, and I knew from his tone he’d only told this story because it had needed to be said. If it hadn’t he probably would have kept it to himself a lot longer. I wasn’t upset by not being the one he’d divulged this part of his life to, just a little surprised, until I realized why. He was showing Marcos he really did understand what Marcos was going through.
I reached over and squeezed Oliver’s hand, letting him know I also understood. Oliver smiled at me, and then linked our fingers together before looking back at Marcos, who wore an expression of concern and confusion all mixed together.
“Well, what I’m trying to say is I get it. I get not being able to give up and move on with your life. I lost almost everything trying to take care of Rich. When he died, I think my parents felt a sense of relief. Like they could move on with their lives now. But I couldn’t, not for years, and it was only possible at all because he died and there was nothing I could do about it.”
I felt my heart breaking for him. Poor, gentle Oliver. Things that had never completely made sense before, suddenly snapped into focus. Oliver had told me that part of the reason he worked so much was to keep himself from drinking. He’d told me that after he’d graduated from Harvard, alcohol had been a way to soothe himself; until he’d started drinking himself to sleep nearly every night. That hadn’t really tallied with the thorough, detailed way in which Oliver approached life. He was an accountant, for god’s sake. But now, things made more sense.
“What if there was?” Marcos asked, breaking the quiet that descended after Oliver had said his piece. “What if there was something you could have done?”
“What?” Oliver asked, incredulous.
“No, look, I’m not saying that there was. I’m just asking, hypothetically, if you’d known you could have done something and maybe stop Rich from dying, buy him more time, would you have done it?” Marcos asked.
“In a heartbeat,” Oliver answered. “Not a doubt in my mind.”
Marcos drained the rest of his beer and looked down at his feet before he spoke again. “They want to take him off life support.”
Not sure I’d just heard right, I first glanced at Oliver and then at Marcos. “What? Who?”
“My parents. My Mami. She’s just…fuck, I don’t know. Tired of waiting? Tired of feeling like everything’s suspended? She keeps talking about his soul and how she thinks it’s trapped.”
“She Catholic?” Oliver asked.
Marcos’s brow furrowed. “Uh, yeah? How’d you know?”
“Purgatorio. I got so sick of that word with my parents. In the end, they said the same thing about Rich. About how they wished he’d just let go. Besides, we’re raza, not a big leap,” Oliver said. Probably because I didn’t speak Spanish, Oliver never used it much around me. It was nice to see him talk to someone in a way he could express himself and be understood on a lot of different levels.
“They’re giving up? That seems? I don’t know? Why now?” I asked.
Marcos shrugged. “I don’t know. I have a month, well, twenty-eight days now, to think of something. God, twenty-eight days to… Fuck. Fuck!” He tightened his hand on the empty bottle before it slipped from his grasp completely as he dashed the tears from his eyes. God, Marcos was a tall man. He towered over Oliver and me, and yet, right now he looked tiny.
Without a word I carefully moved to Marcos’s other side and pulled him toward my chest. It was awkward. He was so much bigger than me and we didn’t know each other all that well, but I figured, if it were me, I would have wanted a hug, some sort of human comfort in that moment. To my surprise, Marcos leaned into it. Poor thing was probably absolutely touch-starved.
I looked over at Oliver, his soft, brown eyes wide with worry as Marcos broke down completely. I let him cry it out on my shirt as I stroked what I hoped was a soothing hand down his spine while shushing him with nonsense words. “Water,” I mouthed at Oliver, and he quietly went to the kitchen and got some, picking up the forgotten beer bottle along the way.
Eventually, Marcos exhausted himself from crying, and after a few more minutes he pulled back and wiped his nose. “God, sorry. I swear I don’t usually fall apart like this. Y’all have been so nice to even have me over here.”
“Hey, no,” Oliver replied. “No, man. It’s alright.”
“I just feel so desperate, you know,” Marcos said, looking back at me now with red-rimmed eyes. “I keep thinking of these crazy ideas to get this to stop. Even things I know aren’t right? Things I know are downright wrong.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, curiosity getting the best of me.
“My mami has a tendency to be, well, superstitious about things,” Marcos added.
My face must have shown my confusion, but Oliver seemed to be able to put the pieces together.
“So, what are you thinking of doing that would make her feel like now wouldn’t be the right time for Pedro’s spirit to leave?” Oliver asked. “It’d have to be something pretty big. Something she wouldn’t want to spoil with a mourning period.” He looked at me as if to explain. “Bad luck.”
Oh. Okay. That made sense.
“Well, I could get married,” Marcos suggested. “But I don’t exactly have a line of omegas out the door chomping at the bit for that. Or if I was to get someone pregnant. Either of those could work. She’d be distracted by all the planning, and she’d have to accept it’d be the wrong time to also have a funeral.” Marcos paled at the word, as if saying it made the possibility more real.
Oliver got up and started pacing. Oliver paced when he thought, said it helped him organize things better. Frankly, I think he just got so balled up with anxiety that if he didn’t move, he’d explode. I was much more the lounge-and-think type, heavy emphasis on lounge. So, Oliver paced, and I lounged as Marcos talked.
“I know that’s emotional blackmail. I’d be manipulating her into stalling, but I have to do something. Pedro and I, we’ve always been close. We’ve had one another’s backs since day one. I can’t give up on him now.”
It was family. I could understand that. Even if my own family had been crappy—all save my granny. People did lots of things for family.
Family. I froze on the word, my eyes glued to Oliver, remembering his proposal, looking up at me like I’d hung the stars in the sky by hand and telling me he wanted a family. Babies.
Babies.
Could we? Fuck. This was perfect. Well, not perfect timing. The timing was admittedly fucked. But, if I’d learned anything in my whole life, it had been that when an opportunity came, you took it. Though I disliked Rob, he’d come at just the right time and offered me a way to stand on my own two feet when I’d needed it. It would mean delaying school, but…it could work. I knew it could in that bone-deep way I’d known it could work when Oliver said he’d loved me and wanted to look after me and help me get through school.
Oliver and Marcos were talking, but to be honest, I had no idea about what. I felt like I’d been struck by lightning.
“Me,” I blurted.
Oliver and Marcos both whipped their heads in my direction, shared looks of bewilderment on their faces.
“This is going to sound crazy. But, me, us,” I said gesturing toward Oliver. The confused looks continued. Sighing, I turned toward Marcos. “Marcos, you said anything. You would do anything to give Pedro more time, right?”
Marcos nodded. I turne
d to look at Oliver. “I know there isn’t much of anything you want more than a family, right? With me?”
“Yes, Mitch. Absolutely, but—”
I held up a hand once I’d gotten what confirmation I needed before turning back to Marcos. “How would you feel about helping Oliver and me start a family?”
Both of their mouths hung open now.
“Hear me out. I have a plan.”
6
Oliver
“What?” Marcos asked Mitch. “What did you say.”
I froze at Mitch’s suggestion. He couldn’t be serious. Two days ago he’d talked about needing time to adjust and a bunch of, well, reasonable stuff that had made sense. This made no sense. This was the opposite of sense. This was…nonsense.
Marcos was wide-eyed as he looked over at me. “You realize you said all that out loud, right?”
Shit. No. “Yes,” I said. “Of course, yes. I know. Mitch, this is crazy. You know it’s crazy.”
“No,” Mitch said. “Does it sound crazy? Hell yes. Is it crazy? I don’t think so. I asked you to hear me out, sweetheart.”
I bit my lip but nodded. I owed him that much. If Mitch wanted to lay out the surely insane reasoning for this, I was at least going to listen to him. I spared a glance at Marcos who looked like he was on the verge of a panic attack. I could keep myself in check, but I wasn’t exactly sure Marcos would be able to. Mitch focused his attention on Marcos now and addressed his initial question.
“It’s perfect, really. I mean, think about it. Oliver wants a family more than anything. And you’re looking for a way to convince your mami to give Pedro some more time. Well, this is the solution, right? Isn’t it obvious? Oliver and I get the ability to start a family and we buy your brother more time.”
I considered it. What I’d expected Mitch to explain wasn’t something so, well, neat. I was an accountant. I was used to things being this neat and orderly at work, but I didn’t expect his outside-the-box idea to be so methodically justified. It was tempting.
“But what about school?” I asked, my brain hunting for potential roadblocks.
“Well, now that we’re in Fort Greene, I have a huge support system of friends here. I’d have to wait until the baby is born before I enrolled, but we’re in a good position for me to balance school and a baby.”
It didn’t sound outlandish. Everyone seemed to know Mitch here. Bennet and he talked constantly, and Mitch had mentioned more than once that Bennet also wanted to go back to school for a nursing degree. It was just possible that it could work.
“Wait, hold on a second. Since when did we decide it was going to be you?” I asked. “I’m an omega, too, you know.”
“Oh, sweetheart. Of course I know,” Mitch said, teasingly. “But it makes sense. You’re at work. I’m, you know, in between things right now. It wouldn’t make sense for you to carry a baby and work the hours you work, even if some of it could be from home.”
“But you just said a few days ago you needed time,” I added.
Mitch got off the couch and came to me, reaching to take my hands in his own.
“Yeah, I did, and if you’re asking me if this is perfect timing, no, it’s not. It really isn’t. But this opportunity is here now. Sure, we could find another alpha’s sperm to use some other time, but when is it ever going to matter this much for him? We could save someone’s life.”
That was true. When I’d suggested we go to a sperm bank I hadn’t expected to actually know the alpha whose sperm we’d use, but Mitch was right. I doubted becoming a father would ever mean as much to any other alpha as it would for Marcos. Speaking of which, I realized Marcos had been silent since Mitch and I had begun discussing things. “Marcos, I’m sorry about all of this. We’re here talking about this like it’s just something between the two of us.”
But when I looked away from Mitch back to Marcos on the couch, he didn’t look offended, didn’t even looked shocked. No. Not at all. He looked intrigued.
“Hypothetically, if we were to do this, how would you feel about it, Oliver? I get there’s a lot of issues and things, but it sounds like Mitch has a response to all of those. None of them are about how you’d feel. How either of you would feel.”
“I don’t know, to be honest.” I glanced at Mitch. He was staring intently at me, his green eyes glittering like he was excited by the prospect. He was doing this, thinking about doing this, for me because he wanted to give me something I’d asked for. I swallowed hard, not sure how to respond to his unspoken question. Would I say yes?
“And how do you feel?” I asked Marcos, wanting his opinion on all of this.
“I want to save my brother,” he said simply, as if that was all that mattered. And I guess, to him that really was all he cared about. Yet Marcos’s question about mine and Mitch’s feelings told me he did actually care about what our decision would do to us as a couple. And that’s where I hesitated.
I understood where Marcos was coming from, that he’d do anything for Pedro. I remember how desperate I’d been to find any answer that would save Rich. Would I have done this to save my brother? Yes. Without question. Would I have lied to people, to my own mother? Probably, if I knew that lie could save him. Still, it seemed like such a huge thing to decide on a whim.
“I’m not ruling it out,” I said to both of them. “I’m just saying it’s a big thing, and it’s probably not something we should decide straight away. I think probably the best thing to do would be take some time so we can all think about it. Make sure it’s really something that works for everyone. It can’t happen if we aren’t all on board.”
Marcos nodded with that. “That makes sense.”
Mitch also nodded. “My heat’s a few days out, anyway. It’s not something we could do today even if we were ready to.”
I felt relieved about that. It would give me some time to wrap my head around all of this and talk to Mitch before anything happened. Everything felt so sudden, and I didn’t like making impulsive choices.
“Give me your phone number, we can talk tomorrow,” I said. I hadn’t meant it as a dismissal, but Marcos stood, wiping his hands over his face as if still a little stunned about the evening’s development. He wasn’t the only one.
“I’d better go, give you two some space,” he said.
“Can I give you a ride?”
“Thanks, but no. I could use the walk back to the hospital to think all this over.” Marcos went to shake Mitch’s hand and was surprised to find himself pulled into a hug instead. I chuckled before offering my hand to Marcos and shaking it before he left.
With the front door closed, I turned around to see Mitch seated again on the couch, looking up at me with placid eyes. I went to him, sitting beside him and taking his hand in mine. He smiled that little knowing smile he had when he thought he was pleasing me. He was always right.
“Are you sure about this, Mitch? I know you. I know how you feel about lost souls. Hell, I was one of them.” Mitch had the biggest heart of anyone I’d ever met. He could never resist someone he thought was on their own against the world. “Are you doing this just because it’s something I wanted, something Marcos needs?”
Mitch kissed me, and I let some of my tension bleed out into his kiss. I was just getting to the point of relaxation when he pulled back.
“That’s two questions, and the answer is yes to the first one. I’m sure about doing this, I promise. I wouldn’t have said it if I wasn’t. As for the second question, then no. I’m not doing it just for you or Marcos. I’m doing it for us. I know I said I wasn’t ready the other day, but I want to give you a family, and doing it this way… It feels absolutely right.” The smile he gave me was shy and warm. “All I could think was what if it was you, sweetheart? What if you needed that from me like Marcos does? I’d do anything in the face of that.”
“I am so in love with you,” I blurted. I was amazed at his heart, his ability to empathize and give so much of himself to others. I pulled him close again, pressed my m
outh to his and focused on kissing him until neither of us could breathe. He moaned under my mouth and rested his hand on my chest.
As the kiss ended, he pressed his forehead to mine. “Is that so?” he asked.
“Absolutely. What? You doubting me?” I asked, as Mitch nosed at my neck. I tilted my head to the side so he could nibble at it.
Mitch hummed low in his throat. “I don’t know, city boy. Better take me to bed and prove it.”
“Is that so?” I asked, sliding my hand up his knee to find him hot and eager in his jeans.
“Mm-hmm. I’m always a fan of your particular brand of convincing.”
I stood up and took his hand to take him to our bed. When we got there, Mitch pushed me back into the pillows and made me watch as he stripped his clothes off, piece by piece, slowly revealing all of his creamy skin. Mitch was a beautiful man, and he knew how to display himself to full effect.
“Look at you,” I said.
“Oh, I’m hoping you’re going to be doing a whole lot more than looking, sweetheart.”
I smirked, reaching for him and pulling him into my clothed lap. He rearranged himself until he was straddling me. “I could be persuaded,” I remarked, putting my hands on his waist. “What do you have in mind? Hmm?” I couldn’t resist any longer, so I started mouthing at his collarbone as he ground his ass into me.
“Mmm, I want you like this. I want you to sit back and watch me fuck myself on you.”
“Well, I’m probably not an expert, but I’m pretty sure I need to lose some clothes first.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” Mitch said, plucking my buttons open one by one. Once he’d stripped me of my shirt, he sucked at my nipples while I threaded my fingers through his silky red hair.
Each nip and tease of his mouth shot electric shocks to my cock, still straining under layers of fabric. Eventually he continued down until he was sprawled between my legs. He brought his hands up to trace my hip bones, and then over my crotch before slowly, Jesus, so slowly, unzipping me and taking me out.
