Chapter Text
First day into elementary school, blonde hair combed to exhaustion and round glasses with thick lenses, Kento wrote down everything that sounded important. Languages are ancient, his meticulous handwriting occupied the very first line of the notebook. Black ink, underlined twice.
Annoyingly meticulous handwriting, since Kento remember being mocked by a taller boy for ripping out one of the pages after a misspell. He also remembers it being something about words as evidence of how long mankind survived—by the time he didn’t know what mankind meant. His teacher was too old and far too poetic but learning new words made Kento excited for Mondays.
Weeks later, Kento had a secret: he loved studying. He despised school around his friends, but Kento always knew what chapter the teacher finished off last class or what pages to read for the next exam. The first week of school meant discovering the semester’s mandatory reading—Kento would devour it all in a month.
His family praised him for being smart, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that Kento wouldn’t believe once they started saying words can lose meaning if not used right. That’s the opposite of what his literature teacher spent the entire year explaining. He has his notebook to prove it.
“If they did”, Kento reasoned with his dad as if he was the adult. “Not a single language would have survived. You yell my name all the time and I still answer. It has the same meaning as it ever did.”
“Some words, if used too often, will lose meaning inside of your heart”, his dad sighed. “Hate is one of those words. One you use way too much, puppy.”
That made Kento snarl. “I’m eight and a half!”
“On that we won’t argue”, he grinned. Messing up the hair Kento combed for ages, he went back to slicing vegetables. Without washing his hands first, Kento quietly judged him. “You’re just like your mom. I bet you’ll be an alpha.”
Kento pretended to agree since he planned on not eating green bell pepper at dinner. His father should be grateful that he isn’t an adult already, because Adult Kento wouldn’t fear disgusting food as punishment for saying the truth. Adult Kento wouldn’t be ashamed of being right. Adult Kento wouldn’t be ashamed of being himself.
As if presenting as an omega or beta would stop him from questioning what doesn’t make sense. And that whole story about losing meaning inside his heart? If I forget the meaning of a word, Kento cursed inside his bedroom, I can just read a dictionary.
His father was being unfair and Kento absolutely hates that.
He thought adults didn’t need to agree with illogical arguments, but years later Adult Kento was made aware of his past self’s mistake. The countless times he heard that hate is such a strong word without uttering a response. One that he shouldn’t be so casual about. Otherwise, they always warn, it’ll turn meaningless.
Needless to say, Kento hates illogical arguments. And he hates his neighbor’s predisposition to loud music. Not charging his phone at night, working overtime, stumbling on a stair in the dark. Green bell pepper, as one does. And you. Recently, Kento hates you the most.
Better wage, same workhours, different boss: it was a good offer. Good enough for Kento to submit his resignation letter and start as an accountant in this firm. Annoying tasks, tense meetings, coffee machine out of order: with this salary, nothing would be a problem for Kento. But you had to ruin it.
After a quick meeting with the manager and being introduced to the financial team, Kento placed his briefcase on the desk designated for him. That is, on what little space was left for him. He sighed for the first time that day.
Frames lacking pictures, empty perfume flask, crumpled posts its. There was a mug filled with pens and a hairbrush, yet most of them were all over the place. Who needs that many pens? Who uses pens nowadays? The pen-hairbrush mug had lipstick marks on.
Kento sighed for the second time when he looked at the desk beside his.
It’s clear his colleague doesn’t know the basics of a keyboard, considering the bag—among many colorful brooches he found one with the omega symbol—pressing P onto an open page. Neither do they understand that one shouldn’t pile used plastic cups and folded science magazines on top of a printer. A vase of magnolias was a surprise amidst all that mess. One Kento quickly forgot, his right eyelid twitching at the sight of acetone and nail polish near piles of documents.
“Morning”, an energetic voice scared Kento off his thoughts. He suppressed a snarl with ease. “You’re the new accountant, right?”
He expected you to be embarrassed but all Kento saw was an omega far more interest in her coffee than his face. As if you could even taste coffee with that much whipped cream. Staring at your eyelids, he didn’t notice the third sigh.
What he noticed was your fully exposed throat. No adhesive patch over your glands or collar around your neck. Golden bracelets covered part of your inner wrists, tinkling pendants bringing more attention to your bare glands.
Thankfully, there was no nauseating scent—a side effect of his suppressants. There was no scent at all coming from you. Good. It would feel like a bad omen to throw up on his first day at this job.
Kento could never go out like that. A dark blue collar covered the base of his neck, thick leather bracelets doing the same beneath his sleeves. He has spares on his briefcase and a flask of black pepper perfume―the only Kento ever found able of covering his natural scent. And it only works because of the hellish amount of suppressants he ingests daily.
That doesn’t mean he judges you for not using anything to cover your scent. The opposite of his, yours is delicate enough to go unnoticed without effort. Still, he would bet money that you forgot to buy an adhesive patch on. And for that Kento does judge you.
“Yes, I am”, he bent down, trying to remain polite. “Nanami Kento.”
“No need for formalities”, you gestured for him to stood up. Posture fixed, Kento watched you unlock the second drawer of your desk. In quick movements, you put all your mess inside the drawer and lock it once more.
Sitting down, you smiled. It reached your eyes, baring your fangs to him. “Welcome.” After telling him your name, you took a sip from the so-called coffee and grabbed your bag. “I’m here if you need any help.”
Kento made a silent promise to never ever come to you if he needed help.
Erasing everything your bag pressed, you searched for something inside it and quickly forgot about Kento’s existence. He threw away a few ignored crumbled papers and came back to his desk to find you holding a headset.
Not only you didn’t care about the organization of your workplace, but you were also unable to apologize or even collect all your things on your own. And as if it wasn’t enough, you offered help just to immediately make sure Kento wouldn’t be able to talk to you.
Adult Kento realized that, to a certain extent, his father was right. That same lesson he heard time and time again, even after his dad claimed to have given up on making him understand, was correct. Inside his heart, the word hate lost its meaning. You and loud music can’t be described with the same word. Maybe he really shouldn’t have used it so often…
No. Kento realized that wasn’t the problem. This isn’t about a word losing meaning, but simply about it not being the correct choice to describe what Kento feels about you.
Within knowing you for less than two minutes, he knew. Kento loathed you.
He’s so nice, you put the noise canceling headset to check on the presentation for today’s meeting. You made a mental note to search in your folders for the introductory material to send him. He didn’t care about all this mess. I’ll get him some coffee later.
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