Holly Ch. 01

"I have cash. I thought I might pay the security deposit tonight if you wanted to rent to me. What is the deposit?"

"Well, in what way are you going to trash the place?"

"No ways. I can keep it looking just like this."

"Then no deposit. Will you be honest with me again?" she asks.

Oh no. Here it comes. She's going to ask if he's A/o and change from an angel into a typical beta. "Do you believe I really can tell when someone wears a mask and is bad underneath? Or am I kidding myself?"

"A lot of people just assume they can. I think you actually can."

"Look, I know you have your secrets. And you deserve privacy. But you're not a liar and I think I don't want to interview anyone else. I do have a contract to sign. I wrote it myself, so it's not legalese. It just states that we agree on the rent and that, if this doesn't work out, I don't just put you out on the road. You get two months to find another place, unless of course, you do something that requires the cops or something like that. I don't see that happening, do you?"

"No, ma'am."

They go to the door at the end of the hall. The office is rather like a cockpit with windows on three sides and a skylight. There is just room for a desk and a panoramic view of the woods. At night, it's creepy as hell with the windows all black. "Gosh, I hate coming in here at night. I half-expect to see something ungodly staring back at me. Here we go."

Holly is grateful for the succinct document, but mainly because it has her name printed on it and he's been aware for a while he doesn't know what to call her. Mary Katherine St. Andrew.

"What do you like to be called?" he asks as he signs.

"Well, as you can see, I'm a Catholic, but I don't need to clobber people over the head with it when I meet them. MK is fine. People just started to call me that and it sticks."

"Emkay," he sounds out. "That's nice for a girl." He tries humor to cover his disappointment; an A/o wouldn't be Catholic, in his experience. There were enough complications living in their private culture amidst the dominant beta one without an added layer of beliefs and rules to follow.

"You're funny. So when were you thinking you'd move in? You don't have to wait for the first if you don't want to. I'm asleep a lot of the time, but don't let that worry you."

"Is tomorrow after work all right with you?"

"Yeah, that's fine. Oh, and you don't have to bother with the shoe rule while you move in. That's not practical. I'll put some... oh, what is it called?" She tilts her head to elongate her skinny neck and the angle of the light makes the shadows around her eyes that much darker. Holly can see he's kept her up too long.

"I'd better get going," he says.

"Okay," she yawns gently. "Wait. The code for the door is 5991. That's the year 1995, but backward. Can you remember that?"

He can, but the year has the sound of infamy. Why should he remember that year?

They make their way back to the stairs. MK sighs. "Going down sucks."

"I could carry you."

"Haha. That's not lost on me. I didn't advertise for someone muscular because I didn't want to give the wrong impression about what I was after, but if you'd been a little old lady I might keep looking."

"Probably a good call."

At the front door, she says, "Well, I'll see you when I see you. Drive carefully. Weather like tonight... you know. We are kind of in the same profession."

"I never met a stuntperson before."

"Most are much cooler. You can do my stunts now, Holly."

She's punchy. It's adorable and Holly doesn't think that about people anymore. They say goodnight.

On the drive home, he feels like screaming fuck you to his current landlords, so he does, while still driving with care. Back in his barn, he's freezing from the contrast, but emotionally warm as a kid on Christmas Eve. Not only is this his last night suffering here, but he's got someplace to go and something worth doing, too. He'll make himself indispensable to this incredible person. Snuggled into his nest of sleeping bags, he repeats the door code over and over like he's counting sheep. It hits him.

1995 was a year that changed everything. That was the Bowling Green Massacre. Seventeen-year-old Hollis Graves and Mama watched the news in horror. Twelve members of an A/o family were gunned down in their duplex. One side housed a mom, dad, and their brood of five. Living happily next door were grandma, her other adult daughter, three grandkids, and the dad, who was deployed overseas.

Even as an alpha teenager, that last fact hit Holly right in the solar plexus. To not be there to save his family or die trying was even worse for an alpha than a "normal" person. It would kill his soul while he kept breathing. To make it worse, that he was in the military, at the time would have meant he was on suppressants, which meant he risked his health in order to risk his life for the country. Yet someone decided everyone he loved needed to be exterminated.

This was in the news cycle for weeks because most Americans didn't even know they were living in an ABO world. The collective shock over the murders was easily replaced by indignation that the world was a bit different than they'd assumed. Neighbors who had sobbed about the nice family they all liked were reinterviewed to say things like, "You think you know someone..." and not about the killer. The pundits were in high demand to offer expert opinions, which only made matters worse.

Unlike the gay community, which advocates tirelessly for inclusion, A/o people typically don't. It's probably that they have their own gay people who struggle as it is without trying to explain physiological differences and customs that date back to prehistory. Gay relationships have to be visible so people can have a love life or a family. A/o relationships just don't in the way D/s couples don't have to share that with the world if they don't want to. It doesn't mean they hate themselves. All the details that began to leak out without understanding led to hysteria. More crimes followed, often against betas who happened to possess the fearsome "trait" of the week.

Holly will never forget one glorious alpha who went on cable news to face an expert. "The problem is that they just don't assimilate," she'd pontificated. "I hate to say it, but they bring this on themselves."

"Let me get this straight," he growled. "A man wears a turban to show the world who he is, and that's not assimilating. We live alongside you, work alongside you, go to war and die with you and you can't even tell who we are, yet that's not assimilating. We disgust you, but you want the details of our private lives. Lady, what the hell do you want from me?"

"Nothing. I want nothing from you," she snapped.

"Really. Your dilated pupils and that smell tell me otherwise."

The woman's face appeared to desiccate on camera into a mishmash of fake tan and pink topographical shapes. No one knew what to say or do. "We'll be back after this break."

Young Hollis had jumped up and cheered. Mama gave him a sorrowful smile. "Hollis baby, you're cheering now, but be very careful."

Over the years his militant streak mellowed out. After all, he couldn't deny that some betas gladdened his heart. Damian didn't hate A/o folks at all. Sure, his awkward curiosity was embarrassing at times, but he meant well and it was a small price to pay for a true friendship. Holly himself, for the first time in his life, had an awkward fascination with a possible omega... and he knew he'd have to talk about this with his best friend, who'd be happy as a pig in shit to finally get some details out of his close-mouthed friend. He'd have to explain why omega women, whom he was supposed to desire uncontrollably, scared the hell out of him. Alphas aren't just animals-they can be neurotic, too.

Maybe something else happened that year that should make it work as a mnemonic. Holly knows in his gut it's some kind of signal. Was it? Damian was happily married and did know more about women A or B or O, so he'd break the wall of silence on the subject and pick his brain a little.

Holly doesn't want to think about murdered children anymore. He wants to drift off imagining a slovenly ginger braid, bionic leg, and what it will be like to finally carry a mighty-hearted omega to bed. But first, that damn tea. He has to piss again.