Page 1 of The Omega's Secret Baby
1
Elias
Please let today go smoothly.
My seven-year old son bounced on the sidewalk beside me and our family dog, ten-year old Labrador Fiona. He was excited; I was anxious, and I gripped his hand tightly. It was his first day back at school after the winter holidays. Jake loved school, but he rarely got along with the other children. And just before the holidays, he’d gotten into a shouting match with one of the other kids that landed him in his first ever detention. It seemed he’d already forgotten all about that, but his alpha genes were starting to express themselves, and I worried that he was going to make a trend of it.
“Look, there's Tommy!” he said, pointing ahead where I could see little Tommy Fuller standing in front of the school gates with his father--another omega like me. Unlike me, though, Tommy Fuller's father wasn't a single dad.
I slowed down a bit even as Jake tried to pull me forward. “Hang on, sweetie,” I said, making him stop. I had no intention whatsoever of getting dragged into a conversation with another parent. I went down on one knee to be on eye-level with my son. He eyed me impatiently as I tried to straighten the wild locks of his blond hair. The same hair as his other father, but Jake didn't know that. It was better that way.
Or so I kept telling myself.
“Can I go now?” he asked, glancing at Tommy, who was waving at him.
“Okay, but remember what I told you.”
“I know! No singing in class.”
“Good boy.” I pressed my lips to his forehead and Fiona put her nose to mine as if she thought it was time for a group-hug. Jake laughed and hugged the black dog--his favorite playmate.
I shook my head at the both of them. “Listen to your teacher, okay?”
“Okay.”
“And play nice with the other children.”
Jake looked at me with eyes so full of defiance it was difficult to believe he was only seven. “Only if they're nice to me too.”
“They'll treat you the way you treat them,” I tried to impart some wisdom to my little troublemaker.
He huffed.
I suppressed a sigh as I got to my feet again, knowing that any more parental advice would be lost on him just now. “Alright, you can go with Tommy. I'll be back later to get you.”
He grinned. “Later, Daddy!”
“I love you,” I called after him, but he was already running off, unafraid.
He'd never been a clingy kid. Considering that I'd always had to work to keep us fed, that was fortunate. And I had work to get to now as well, so I gently tugged on Fiona's leash and turned back the way we'd come. Internally I congratulated myself for having escaped a run-in with the other parents.
* * *
The day couldn't continueto go that smoothly of course. As soon as I got into work, I was swamped with things to do. Working at a small town’s even smaller animal shelter wasn’t what I’d always dreamed of doing, but it was still a job I enjoyed—and one that I knew I was lucky to have. Recently, though, things were becoming difficult. In short, the shelter struggled with financial issues. There was never enough money for all the things the animals needed. Food, vaccines, medications... We only had five dogs, four cats and two birds at the moment, but taking care of them wasn't cheap. And lately, one of my co-workers, an arrogant guy in his mid-thirties by the name of Harold, had gotten it into his head that one of us was going to be laid off--and it wasn't going to be him. No, it was going to be the omega, because who cared about omegas? They weren't made for the workplace anyway, right?
Harold took every opportunity he could get to dig into me. That day too, he went, “You're late!” as soon as I arrived at the shelter.
I ignored him as I unleashed Fiona and led her to the other dogs--one of the perks of working at the shelter--no one cared if I was bringing my own dog with me so long as she wasn't getting in the way. Most of my co-workers had adopted one or two animals in the time they'd worked here so this was nothing unusual.
“Hey, I'm talking to you,” Harold insisted. He wasn't in a higher position than me at work; we were both really on the lowest rung of the ladder, but you wouldn't know it from his behavior.
“I heard you,” I said, slowly turning to him. “But I'm not late.” Well, maybe two minutes, but I couldn't take my son to school any earlier than I already did.
He shook his head. “You're always late. You know I'm not the only one who notices either.” He nodded his head in the direction of the boss's office, as if trying to tell me that I needed to watch out.
I merely shrugged. “I'm doing the best I can.” And considering that I was severely underpaid, that had to be enough. But underpaid or not, I couldn't afford to lose this job because my rude co-worker made me ignore my responsibilities, so I tried to cut the conversation with Harold short. “Excuse me, but I have a few dogs who need to be taken out on their morning walk. Don't want to make them wait any longer.”
“They shouldn't have to wait at all,” Harold called after me, but I ignored him. Who needed to talk to people like Harold when there were so many lovely dogs here? All five of them wagged their tails excitedly when they saw me enter the kennel with the leashes. They were used to their routine and knew exactly what was coming. And I think it wouldn't be too much to say that they liked me. I'd always been good with animals. Cats, dogs, birds, mice, it didn't matter. I could look into their eyes and establish some sort of immediate understanding. Or at least it felt like that to me. Doing anything like that with actual people was far harder. Humans were infinitely more complicated than animals.
