The Beta Is His Omega

Rhys

That same week, a sensational piece of news broke out, not only among the senior batch but also throughout the whole school: Mei Griffiths and Rhys Holcroft had started going out.

The moment he heard about it, Ren felt a gut-wrenching pain that was so extreme, he became nearly unresponsive. 

He and his friends were once again having their lunch, this time on a picnic table under a gigantic tree, located in one of the school’s quadrangles. 

Right now, however, Ren could no longer eat. His appetite had died an instant death, his heart dying right along with it.

Because seriously, what kind of sick joke was this? How could such a shitty coincidence happen?

He was actually being entirely truthful the other day. If things had been different, it was really Mei Griffiths that Ren would have had a major crush on. 

But… Rhys Holcroft just happened to exist in the same world, and for the entire three years of their senior high school, he was all that Ren ever really saw.

A day may come when Ren would see things a different way. 

If asked, “How good is your taste in men and women?” he would answer: it’s great. It was so top-notch, in fact, that the two people he liked most ended up getting together. They clearly saw in each other what he saw in them, so this was only the most logical outcome. He might even be able to build a matchmaking career out of this great taste of his.

Certainly, a day like that may come, but… it was not this day.

Mistaking the true cause of Ren’s reaction, a friend from Mei and Rhy’s class clapped him on the shoulder in rough comfort.

“Since it’s you,” he said, “you would have stood a chance against any other alpha who showed interest in Mei. There wasn’t exactly that much competition. But against the Rhys Holcroft?" He shook his head sadly. "My condolences, mate.”

“It’s seriously so bizarre, though,” said that same female friend from last time. “I never thought I’d see the day when that guy would show an interest in anyone, let alone in Mei Griffiths, of all people. What could have brought that on?”

Another of Mei and Rhys’ classmates wondered aloud, “Could Rhys have heard us the other day? I think I saw him sitting near us that time…”

Their other classmate immediately shot that possibility down as absurd. “Would you ask someone out just because you heard others say good things about them?”

The others paused and thought about it. 

“Yeah… not really,” one answered.

But another said in a considering tone, “Well… if I already liked them beforehand, and I found out someone else liked them too—maybe enough to make a move on them?—I might feel I needed to hurry and take my own chance already.”

Upon considering this, the others felt that the speaker made sense. Almost as one entity, they turned to look at Ren with expressions that said, “It was kind of your own fault that this happened, then, but we pity you anyway.”

But Ren himself wasn’t convinced by that reasoning. Shaking his head slowly as he came out of his pain-induced daze, he said, “Why would it matter to him what I thought or what I may have planned to do? To Rhys Holcroft… I’m just a nobody.”

“…”

Being some of the few betas who’d managed to not only get in but also last until senior year in this elite alpha school, the others thought they knew exactly how Ren felt. And though they privately agreed with him now that he’d pointed out such a bitter truth, they still tried to be supportive friends.

“You said yourself,” one of them told him, “Mei is different. She might have given you the time of day if you’d taken your shot.”

“And you know what?” another interjected. “Maybe you still have a chance even now. After all, couldn’t their relationship be just an arranged one? What if it’s actually their families that did the talking, and that’s why it all seems to have come from out of nowhere?”

Hearing that, everyone felt even more enlightened. Indeed, there was a strong possibility that that was actually what had happened.

But even if it was…

Where Ren was concerned, it was simply pointless no matter what the truth was. No mere words could solve the problem of his second gender for him, or even just make the pain he felt feel better.

And while Ren’s friends were well-meaning, through no fault of theirs, they were just completely off the mark. 

Because it wasn’t Mei Griffiths he liked. It wasn’t her that he would have wanted even a sliver of a chance with.

Now that it’s come to this… he knew, it was better if he spent his time and energy on giving up instead. 

Anyway, it wasn’t a big deal. It was just a silly schoolboy crush.

Or at least, that's what he tried to tell himself.

***

Ren still wasn’t sure how it happened, but somehow, someway, he was now serving punishment for some offense.

What’s more, he wasn’t the only one.

A mere two weeks before they were to graduate and likely part ways forever—somehow, someway… Ren Ashford was now alone with Rhys Holcroft.

School had been let out early that day. Just before dismissal, Ren had been informed by his homeroom teacher to head to the principal’s office. Though curious, he only nodded then and didn’t take the time to ask what it could be about. He knew better, after all, than to hold up his alpha classmates’ time for his own personal concerns.

However, he didn’t get the chance to ask the teacher about it after dismissal either, so when he headed to the principal’s office, he went in blind.

Then again, he doubted the teacher would have warned him that he wasn’t the only one who got called in.

But he would have appreciated, at least, to not appear so clueless as to why.

“Ma’am, you called for me?” Ren asked the alpha female principal in her fifties, who had been quick to invite him in after his knock.

In his preoccupation, he was already halfway through the doorway before he noticed that she wasn’t alone in that office. 

Seated on one of the armchairs in front of her desk was none other than his ex-crush, Rhys. 

Ren froze.

As he slowly turned around to look behind him, the large guy looked as eye-catching as ever with his long and thick bronze-tinted hair, which Ren always thought gave him the appearance of a lion. 

He had the kind of air that tempted others to describe him more as a lone wolf, but Ren saw it a little differently. To him, Rhys’ hair wasn’t the only thing that was cat-like about him.

Yes, Rhys had only a few people that he interacted with, mostly preferring to keep to himself, but he was not exactly cut off from others, deliberately or otherwise. Ren didn’t know another way to describe it except that Rhys naturally “stood apart." He was simply in a complete league of his own.

And he too was someone who did not follow the so-called rules of being an alpha. That guy who’d be staring out the window absently during class or outright sleeping over his desk? That was him. He was the type who simply did not exert any effort into anything, yet somehow, he was great at every sport, and after every exam, he always scored within the top ten. 

All of this combined gave others the unmistakable and despair-inducing feeling that if he actually tried, he’d leave everyone else far behind him in the dust.

This was why all the other alphas around, even those at the very top in sports and academics, quietly deferred to him almost without them meaning to. They preferred giving him a wide space rather than risk waking him up from his slumber and provoking from him a deafening roar of dominance.

He never once took up his seemingly natural right to rule over everyone else, but to Ren, Rhys was the undisputed aloof king of this little jungle.

And he was sure, wherever Rhys might go to next, it would be the same there too.

Ren managed to quickly jolt himself from his freeze. As he continued to enter before closing the door behind him, it was with his signature sleepy gaze that Rhys watched Ren.

Just before the principal spoke and called his attention back to her, Ren briefly met those entrancing silver-gray eyes set within his Greek god face, receiving a critical hit in the process.

He pretended indifference and approached the other seat that the principal had just offered. All the while, he thought, ‘s**t, me, get a hold of yourself—you’re supposed to be over him already!’