Sean was just as pretty in the morning as he laid asleep in my bed. I couldn’t wake him after two days of wearing and tearing that tanned paintwork all over his body. I’d taken that caramel and given him a full flush! I let the mechanic sleep while I pondered on his reluctance to answer my question about my age.

It did kill the vibe, and it stared back at me in the mirror…and then back into the bed as I got under the duvet and tried to fall asleep again. But I couldn’t do that now with Sean stirring to the opened curtain that I drew for some sunlight to help with that. I was never a late riser, and Sean seemed to like a lie in.

When he was up, I was seated with my diary that had my notes on clients who needed their taxation sorted. The month was coming up, and claims would be met. But I placed it at the side and felt timid beside Sean’s bubbly return to the world.

“I slept like a polar bear.” Sean yawned and then sat up to be level me with. “How did you sleep?”

“Like I’d run for mayor.”

“That’s a better way of putting that!” He scratched his sandy blond hair that’s a little unhinged. “You should be proud, I’d elect you for round three if it wasn’t for the end of your monthly desperation.”

“I don’t need to be raging with lust to jump you, Sean.”

“Glad to hear it…but you still have to be complimented on how good you are.”

“Was I the best you ever had?” A little disdain crept up in me.

“Better than the guy who claimed he could last for twenty-four hours.”

“Was he lying?”

“He managed to bring me to the end of the world…then I told him that’s enough. I’m not made of your steel.”

“So, he was better than me then?”

“No. It’s a joke. The joke is that he brought me to the end of the world because he had a head full of steel and couldn’t last for five -seconds…the idiot! Why lie? Better to be honest and state what you can do.”

I didn’t find it that funny, but Sean’s bounciness kept me tickled pink with a cheeriness that had me in stiches. “I’m glad I impressed you then.”

“More than you want to admit.”

“It’s not that I’m not grateful for the compliment…it’s just been a long time since I’ve realized that I still have the will to please and be pleased. I was so nervous. I can’t tell you how much I felt silly for being so horny.”

“We spoke about that…it’s fine.”

The silence came, and Sean broke it by deflating his cheeks that had trapped air. It made me smirk as he attached his shoulder closer to me and then slouched until his head was level instead.

“One thing that does bother me though, and take it as you will, but how can an Omega who owns such a comfortable bed be single?”

I didn’t see the humour with that one. It just brought me to a gloomy bushel and I didn’t want to pick any happy apples. I knew only a fraction of Sean, and that was with his clothes off. He wasn’t welcomed to the full part of the story just yet. That was going to come with patience, if he would stick around. “I have my reasons.”

“Oh!” This makes Sean sit up. “Reluctance. I sense it in the air. But I do want to get a little more depth, Robbie.”

“Two days of sex equals a proper conversation, huh?”

“It does.”

I speak, so Sean doesn’t have to nod-his-head-off. “I’m sort of a…the word they labelled me under in the community is a social pariah. I run around pack-less in their eyes and I suppose they have a point. I don’t mingle much since…well, I’ve just been single for a very long time and nobody wants to touch goods past their expiration date.”

“Not true. And I’m sure there’s a droplet more on the reason why you—”

“What about you, Sean?” I didn’t want to make both him and myself uncomfortable. It was best that I changed the subject. Even if his thin eyebrows nearly skyrocketed off his brow and then relaxed with him leaning away from me. “I want to know more about your life.”

Sean came back next to me and looked ahead of him at my Siberian bull-worm collection on my window. They were hairy brown worms longer than a size seven shoe encased in fibre glass. “Those remind me of mutant sperm, and I’m sorry to be so graphic.”

“You’re the first person to look at a Siberian bull-worm and call it sperm. But I like the creativity. Have you seen any in your lifetime?”

“Urgh…I hope not. But in truth, I wouldn’t know a worm from a termite when I hit that road to where I need to go.”

“So, you enjoy travelling?”

“The wind smacking me into tears and nearly throwing me off my bike is what I love…definitely. But my trip to Juneau is a little more on the technical difficulties plan. I have to visit a Beta cousin who wants to get all political for the sake of equal rights. Usually I take my sexy beast-mo-bile and high-tail it through California and Alaska; stop off…have a little fun…and then be on my way. But…he’s got me making a detour this time round.”

“What’s your cousin in an uproar about?”

“Mistreatment within the Alaskan Shifter Council. Betas want better treatment and I fully understand that when they come through the cities of Juneau, Anchorage, and Fairbanks. I feel their pain. I really-really-do, but I’m a mechanic. And I need him to just think about joining and what that will mean if he does.”

I cross my arms to that. “Huh. So, him joining the beat cause hampers with…” I needed Sean to delegate to me more.

“Hampers with my profession. We need to be on friendly terms with the council. And if he joins this, then they’ll uproot us straight out and we can’t afford that.”

I shrugged. “Times are changing. The year two thousand has passed, and I agree with your cousin and his cause. It’s the sort of period where reproduction isn’t the only value out there on the market. Shifters need all units and those contributing to society to chip in. And if you want to go into mortality rates—”

“I don’t—”

“But I’ll mention it anyway…then you’ll find that Omegas’ birthing mortality is practically nil. And Alphas thankfully aren’t having a massive sweep in the erectile dysfunction sector. Why shouldn’t your cousin hope to be treated as an equal? I hate the idea of class divides: with segregation happening all around. I would join them too!”

Sean threw the blanket off and then cupped his balls underneath his hands. I found that funny, but the direction of this conversation was taking a turn for the serious. “Before I exposed my balls to you, I was going to say that of course you would say that: you’re an Omega! If you were an Alpha you’d know how important money-making is.”

We got up…rephrasing that, I got up and found my boxers were suddenly too tight around my ass. I didn’t have any surgery overnight! But I chucked them into the bin as I walked nakedly to find another pair: opened the drawer, and saw what Sean meant about me being very organized with four-lines-of-four and each pair separated in colours of navy blue; sky blue; white; and black.

“You look good in black.”

I went for the black pair. “Thanks. But to get back to our conversation, Sean, I would say that you’re right.”

He was putting on his socks…one sock, the other he was frustratingly trying to find in every spot but right in front of him. Yes, I saw the sock that he couldn’t see.

“Try taking a few steps back, and you’ll find the lucky sucker.”

Sean took only one step and realized how blind he was. “I sense that your agreement with me comes from some ill feeling.”

“Maybe a little. I think Alphas get it a little easier in the department of work and society overall. You’re the top dogs. The prime choppers who have it easier. You’d have no idea what it would be like to be an Omega or Beta.”

“Hey.”

I stopped him half-way from putting on his t-shirt. It meant I got one last view at the 4-pack.

“That’s a little harsh for you to say—”

“But no less true! Why would you need to come down to our level when everything is setup for you to prosper from?”

“You’re sounding just like him now…politics isn’t my cup of tea so you’re looking at it from the wrong side of my perspective.”

We took the conversation to the kitchen, where I washed up and he stood behind me. “I don’t expect you to endure the standards that we do, Sean.”

“It’s got sod all to do with standards, Robbie. I’m a pretty straight forward guy, and being an Alpha covers my personality comfortably.” Sean spread both his arms out wide with a laid-back shrug. “I like freedom. Nothing more…nothing to post home about. That’s all I want. And being an Alpha stamps that on my forehead, and tells the fortunate few who get to rumble in the furnace with me that I won’t provide them with any problematic hinges.”

“You sound more like a problematic sum. The fortunate few who get to know you has to be aware of that stamp you have then?”

“Of course.”

“Then you should respect that it’s your singleness that keeps you free. And not your Alpha status.” And with that shutting him up, and me irritated at my foolishness for hooking up with such free thinker — I had to contemplate the next move…because I had no idea how to deal with a nag-a-de-nag telling me I was one step away from a new-found dilemma.