Chapter Text
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The seconds ticked backwards on the song playing on his phone, each passing moment mounting his sense of dread, and so early in the morning. It was his favourite song too, an upbeat, jazzy ballad with desperate lyrics where the singer begged their lover to not leave them, but there was never a response back. He couldn’t say he knew the feeling well, but he could relate with wanting someone to mutually belong to, someone who truly understood him and paid attention to every detail with meticulous care. Not because he paid him to, not because they wanted the benefits of his social standing, but because they simply and honestly wanted to.
Because they loved him.
Was that too much to ask?
Sadly, that was never in the cards for the first and only son of the owner of a historical, long standing family business. Maison Kang was a name everyone with access to a shopping mall was familiar with, as it had its own flagship stores among several other luxury clothing and accessory brands acquired over the years under its umbrella. Hell, even the heir himself was a walking billboard for the brands, decked head to toe in designer clothes, opting for a tan pea coat over a cream chiffon blouse, brown dress pants tailored within an inch of his life, and sleek brown ankle length leather boots that elongated his legs tastefully.
People trying to side up to the Kang Yeosang was nothing new, and neither were their obvious ulterior motives. Age or gender never mattered, they all wanted the same thing, as if just breathing his same air was enough for his hereditary “success” to rub off on them, or to score a free, viral item of the month. Add to all that, he was the most coveted omega in the entire school, alphas drooling at the chance to even get a whiff of interest in them. At first, they’d test the waters, see if anything had changed about the bachelor in the time away from school that would indicate he was off limits, but as the days dragged on, the obvious became more and more difficult to hide, and they’d gain enough courage to harass him as they had for the past two years.
He’d heard and seen it all, and was disgusted with the lengths people would go to for money, power, or popularity, even if just from his looks alone.
Usually, people parted for him down the hallways as if touching him were enough to cause a legal scandal. In their defense, it probably would be if his parents were present, but not for the reasons they thought. Their son must remain pristine, and despite going to the most prestigious university in the city, the majority of the student body would never be able to meet any of their superfluous standards, even if the other students themselves were also children of well-known celebrities or businesspeople. No, he wouldn’t get to choose, and just like everything else in his life, his path would be laid before him with walls beside it high enough to deter any thought of climbing out.
To be honest, it was simpler this way. Easier. All he had to do was play the part, and everything in his life would be taken care of. His name would go up on a plaque under his father’s, and his father’s father, and his father’s father’s father as if it meant anything to have it etched in gold on the side of Maison Kang’s headquarters.
He’d timed the song perfectly to end as he rounded the corner that led to the entrance of his first class, maximising the time he could keep his headphones in before the professor’s voice fought his will to stay awake. It wasn’t much of a worry, as his personal assistant had procured him a hot mocha from some fancy cafe nearby the university, like they did every morning. Yeosang lifted the cup to his cherry lips, obscuring his vision while he let his legs guide him into the familiar room, only to feel the cup bounce against his teeth then tip away from him in the rebound as he crashed into… a wall?
Books and papers cascaded onto the floor, and a grunt came from the immovable object that didn’t make way for him. His chest bumped against the plush grey fabric of the man’s hoodie, a glimpse of a wet coffee stain now dyeing the middle R of Thunder University from white to a deep chocolate brown.
“Oh, I’m so sorry. Didn’t see you coming in,” the mop of black hair said as he bent down to pick up his books, “I went into the wrong classroom.”
Yeosang immediately bent down as well, placing his cup daintily on the ground before helping the man pick up the massive pile of books and syllabi he had stacked in his arms prior to their collision. Crazy, all of them together must’ve weighed a ton.
“No worries, happens. Are you okay, though? I’m sorry for bumping into you.” His deep voice reassured while still laced with a hint of worry.
“Yeah, I’m fine, thank you, I should have been looki- oh.”
The heir lifted his head to finally meet eyes with him, who had been too occupied with picking up his stuff to get a good look. Frozen as he absentmindedly took the books and papers that were being handed to him, his mouth hung agape.
Immediately, Yeosang’s heart sank. He didn’t look older than him, thanks to his round cheeks and youthful haircut, and given his brand new hoodie and stack of textbooks, he was probably a freshman.
Even the new students knew who he was, of his reputation. He could never escape.
Yeosang cleared his throat, and dropped the small, friendly smile that was slightly curling his lips. “Really, I should be the one apologising. I stained your new hoodie. Please, let me get you a new one, it’s the least I could do.”
The man’s saucer eyes dropped to his chest, blinking back to reality. “Ah, I hadn’t even noticed. No, don’t worry about it. It’s just coffee, it’ll come out in the wash.”
“But you’ll wear it like that all day?”
“Yeah, I mean it’s fine. You really don’t need to bother.”
“Look, if it’s got anything to do with who I am or anything, it really isn’t an issu-”
“Huh? What are you talking about?”
Yeosang’s jaw clicked shut before he could finish his words.
The man’s thick, dark brows furrowed in confusion, settling the stack of books effortlessly on his hip while he waited for the other to explain himself.
“Really?” was all Yeosang could muster, decently confused himself.
“Yeah,” he replied simply. “I have no idea who you are.”
“Truly?”
“Yes…”
Awkward silence stretched between them, furthered by the crowd that had unknowingly gathered around the two, clogging up the entrance to the classroom. Yeosang’s mind raced, it wasn’t a new tactic for people to pretend like he didn’t know him just to get close, but he’d been able to literally sniff out their intentions within the first few minutes of their interactions. Alphas especially were cocky that way, their scent always gave them away before their mouths did.
But all he could sense was the muted, damp smell of a forest after heavy rain, and an underlying sweetness of blackberries, with the generic alpha musk. Not unpleasant, or overbearing in the least. Just calm, and unapologetically natural.
The man wasn’t lying.
Yeosang laughed nervously to break the tension he felt around them, pulling an even more confused look from the burlier man. He tilted his head and finally caught wind of the audience around them, then pulled his stack of books to his broad chest.
“W-well, uh, I gotta get going. Don’t want to be late on my first day,” he started as he stepped around the heir, eager to escape the attention at any cost.
“Wait.”
The younger man spun around, nervousness pursing his lips cutely.
“Yeosang.”
“Sorry?”
“Yeosang, that’s my name.”
The gears turned behind his big brown eyes, mouth opened and closed as he thought of what to say next but settled on the only thing he had time for.
“Jongho. See ya later.”
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“So you spilled coffee on him, he wouldn’t let you pay for a new hoodie, then he booked it?”
“Yes, Wooyoung, how many times-”
“Sorry, it’s just a wild story. That he didn’t even know who you were…”
“Not everyone is chronically online like you are, love,” another voice came, accompanied with the mindful clunk of ceramic mugs onto the wooden table they were seated at. “Some people actually live their lives without being glued to the screen for every social update.”
Wooyoung stuck his tongue out at the buff man that slid into the chair next to him, his phone the incriminating evidence in his hands.
“Both of you benefit greatly from my nosiness, don’t lie” he said in a huff, “but you gotta agree it’s weird, Sannie. I mean, Yeosang’s practically the face of the school ever since he got in. He’s on the website banner and everything! How did he not know?”
Yeosang sighed into the cup filled to the brim with yet another mocha, this time the foam formed into the shape of a cute bear. It kind of reminded him of the man he’d bumped into earlier that morning, only furthering his annoyingly present grief.
It’s not that he cared that Jongho didn’t know him. He loved it, actually. It meant that outside of the two people his parents were never able to shake off of him despite how much they tried, eventually seeing them as a benefit since they were even more fiercely protective of Yeosang than even they were, he could potentially have a new friend.
The first in over a decade.
“Regardless,” Yeosang continued after taking a sip of his drink, “I’d have to see him again for anything to ever happen. He’s a freshman, I’m a junior. I doubt we’ll have any overlapping classes.”
“Do you forget who your best friend is? You’ve got a first name, I’ll do the rest,” Wooyoung unlocked his phone for the umpteenth time and began tapping away at the screen with a speed that Yeosang swore was faster than light.
San eyed his friend and boyfriend cautiously as he drank, Yeosang’s immediate distress reflected on his face. “Youngie-”
“Lets see here, Jongho… Jongho… Aha! Got i-”
“Youngie,” San said with a sterner tone that caught everyone’s attention, making them sit up straighter, his wide palm covering his partner’s screen. “Cut it out.”
Wooyoung opened his mouth to protest to his alpha, but the piercing glare directed at him was enough to put him in his place.
“Sorry, Sangie. I got carried away. This just never happens is all.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Yeosang said as he downed the rest of his hot mocha, a bubbly mustache quickly licked away, “I doubt he’d want to be anywhere near me anyway, once he finds out who I am. It won’t take long.”
It didn’t matter if Yeosang was interested in making a new friend, the normal way. Getting to know each other through casual or deep conversations with coffee and books in the middle, or walking around campus between classes just to catch up, it would never happen. He was much too grown and already too well-known, too settled into his adult role in his family to be allowed that chance ever again. It would end up hurting Jongho too, in the end. Being associated with him in any way would make prying eyes and itchy fingers start digging where they weren’t supposed to, and given his strict monitoring, the other man would be caught in the crossfire only Yeosang could see coming.
Those big brown eyes that stared back at him with confusion that morning, yet softened with a gentle kindness that radiated from within didn’t deserve that, ever, and only he could nip it in the bud before it got any worse.
The heir stood up and slung his leather book bag over his shoulder, barely paying any attention to his best friends. All of this was affecting him way more than he had anticipated.
“Sorry guys, I’m just not feeling it today. I’ll message you later, okay? And really, don’t worry. I’m fine. I’ll get over it.”
“Okay…” San said quietly, waving him off. “Let us know when you get home.”
Yeosang flashed them the brightest smile he could muster before turning away and leaving the cafe.
The pair sat in silence as they saw him leave, quickly accompanied by security guards dressed in common clothes who were pretending to be standing outside the establishment having a smoke and drinking some coffee in the chilly autumn air. Their concern weighed heavy, quieting the usually chatty men until they saw their friend step out of view.
San sighed heavily, slumping his back into his chair and pouting, uncharacteristically cute despite the tough guy persona he usually carried.
“I thought I was his best friend,” he moped.
“Yah, nevermind that,” Wooyoung slapped him on the chest, a little bounce on his defined pectoral fighting to stay within his black compression shirt, “You actually need to see what I pulled up.”
Without losing his pout, San’s cat-like eyes dragged over his omega’s screen, only to widen with every sentence he read over.
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The hounding had started early that year. Merely a couple of weeks had passed before the alphas were breathing down his neck, literally and figuratively, on a daily basis. He should have known, the closer he came to his graduation date, the less easily accessible he became, before entering into his hereditary role within his family’s company and was closed off to the rabble for good. Each time, alphas became more and more desperate to capture his attention, his heart, or his body, short of causing him any physical harm, but not any less disgusting in their attempts. False gifts, cornering him in classrooms or hallways, sneaky ploys to get his phone number or pretend to bump into him, as word had spread like wildfire that it had worked before.
Thankfully, Yeosang had an invisible force field around him, created by his parents’ influence or his “scary dog” privilege with San and Wooyoung by his side when they were nearby, but he couldn’t be protected forever. Not that he couldn’t fend for himself, he could sharpen his tongue without hesitation while still retaining his princely image, although no one would really dare to tempt fate like that. It was one of the few times he was grateful for the untouchable perception others had, although deep down, he craved for the opposite, as long as it was truly genuine, which it never was.
He timed the music he was listening to on his phone to end just as he was entering his first class, on a different day with a different schedule. Avoiding others trying to make painful small talk was an automatic part of his day, so he didn’t want to dwell too much on getting to know his classmates when they weren’t willing to do the same. That morning, he had a third year business administration course, mostly filled with faces he was familiar with already, until in the middle of the small, auditorium-style classroom, he spotted a vaguely recognizable grey form sat in the middle of the middle row. Strange, it didn’t strike him as anyone who was taking that class from the couple of weeks before, so he chalked it up as an early transfer and tried to find his usual spot in the back.
Until, the man turned around.
They locked eyes as the rest of the students poured in behind them. He was still wearing the same grey hoodie as the first day, but this time the R had faded to a light cream colour in contrast to the rest of the bright white letters. Whatever coffee that cafe used, it seemed to be industrial strength. Yeosang couldn’t help but chuckle to himself, and give him a shy smile and a small wave.
He’d thought about Jongho a lot since they’d met. Their chance interaction had given him a faith he’d thought he’d lost, only to quickly extinguish that candle’s flame before it could roar into something bigger. No, he knew it was for the best of them both that he kept his distance, and accepted the fact that they’d only be acquaintances that only say hi to each other in the hallways and nothing else.
So why were his feet guiding him to the middle row? There were plenty of empty seats all around, and since this was a higher-level class, there were probably only thirty or so students at most.
“Hi,” he squeaked, standing over the seated man.
“Hey,” Jongho replied back, his eyes slightly wide.
He knew, he must know by now, but Yeosang wanted to not care, for once.
“Is this seat taken?” he asked, still smiling sweetly.
“No,” the other breathed, a thick swallow followed by his answer.
The heir eased elegantly into the chair beside him, dropping his leather book bag into the seat on the other side to stop anyone from sitting on his empty side. In the same motion, he pulled out a tablet with a white cover, decorated in little teddy bears in a fun, yet chic pattern, opened it and turned it on to an already opened sheet of ongoing notes.
The younger man stared as he settled himself in, suddenly tense, and covered his paper notebook with his arm, fidgeting a bit to make it harder for Yeosang to see anything he may have written.
They sat in silence as their ancient professor struggled to get their presentation going, both looking ahead with opposing degrees of comfort.
Jongho squirmed again. “So you uh, like bears?”
Yeosang smiled a little wider, his face turned to him now. “Yeah, I think they’re cute. It’s going to sound silly, but I’ve got a few at home I sleep with still. Is that weird?”
“N-no, not at all,” he answered as he fought his desire to have the ground swallow him whole. “Pretty cute.”
“I see you like uh,” he looked around him to find any defining features, but didn’t, “wearing the same hoodie?”
“I washed it,” came the quick clarification, as if it needed to be said.
Yeosang chuckled, deep and sweet. “I can see that. Looks comfy.”
With that, Jongho pulled the neck of the hoodie over his mouth, and slumped into his chair when the professor dimmed the lights and finally started the class.
For the rest of it, the content of the class took them over. Sure, it was dry and boring, but the heir watched as the man beside him started to fervently take notes, the generic blue ink pen in his left hand gliding over the paper with ease. He wrote quickly, made additional asides to himself and references earlier topics, all with page numbers and different symbols to signify what was related to what. The question of why a freshman was in a junior-level class had been swimming in Yeosang’s brain since he saw him there, but was definitively answered when his seat partner had fully locked in to the class. Still, it made him even more curious as to who Jongho was, and how he’d gotten here in the first place.
One notebook that had different colour tabs with the class names written on them, sectioning the papers. A generic, half-finished blue ink pen that looked like it belonged on some rundown desk somewhere, the repeat use of the school hoodie, still being used despite the stain.
It wasn’t hard to put two and two together, but that all meant that the younger alpha was a much more extraordinary person than he had first thought.
When the lesson was over, Jongho flipped his notebook closed and stuck his pen into the rings before sliding it into his black athletic backpack, which was clean, but from the wear of the straps and bottom, was far from its first day of use.
“Jong-”
“Yo, Yeosang!”
The omega smelled him before his name was even called out, a strong scent of whatever heavy cologne he was wearing, almost as if it were competing with his natural alpha musk. He pretended to cough so he was able to cover his nose with the scarf wrapped around his neck, wondering how anyone around him survived the miasma of arrogance and overcompensation. The alpha was also someone he’d never met before, but they clearly thought themselves familiar or confident enough to interrupt them.
“What a boring class, huh? That old fart just kept droning on, and on,” said the nameless alpha, once again too comfortable to be speaking in such a way with him.
“I thought it was fine, maybe a little dry but he’s very knowledgeab-”
“Yeah, yeah! Of course, super smart. Hey listen, I was thinking about going for some drinks. Wanna play hooky and bounce? Not like you need to be taking any of these classes anyway.”
Yeosang felt his eye twitch. It was so textbook it hurt. Some jerk alpha assumed they knew everything about him because of his name, and only saw him as a pretty face attached to a big, juicy paycheck. Between the potent stench and the disgusting attitude, he felt his stomach churn.
“Ah, no thanks, but thanks for the invite.”
“Aww really? C’mon, it’ll be fun! You always seem so uptight, might do you some good to unwind for a while.”
He really didn’t know who this guy thought he was, or couldn’t fathom how he thought his constant insults were working in his favour. Auburn eyebrows furrowed, the bottom of his face still hidden beneath his scarf.
“Listen, I-”
“He’s got plans already.”
Both the alpha and omega’s attention was suddenly on the other alpha. Yeosang’s heartbeat drummed in his ears.
“Oh? And who the fuck are you?” the stranger growled in a way that made the hairs at the back of the heir’s neck prickle.
Yet, despite the sudden confrontation, Jongho’s energy remained calm. He’d straightened his back, broad shoulders only accentuated by the bagginess of his grey hoodie, but nothing about him said he was starting a fight, nor that he was backing down.
His nose and heart begged for relief, and in the heat of the moment, Yeosang found himself closing the distance between himself and the younger man, wrapping his arm around his waist and practically digging his face into his neck. He inhaled deep, muffled by his scarf thankfully, and his mind transported to the rainy forest and blackberry bushes he’d missed since the first day he smelled them.
He’d have to make it up to the younger man for real, this time.
“This is my boyfriend,” the heir stated decisively, but in the most polite tone he could muster, “so if you don’t mind, kindly back the fuck off.”
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