Chapter Text
Cole went to his father’s work just once, when the man was still alive.
He was eight, and he’d never been allowed before - he hadn’t even known where the place was.
But his mother was sick - she had been for days, and his father hadn’t come home for days, and she was crying when she did it, but she gave him the address and asked him to go.
He didn’t really want to.
He didn’t understand why they even needed the man - all he did when he was home was eat their food, and yell, and keep his mom in their bedroom.
The last time the man had been home he’d hit her, and Cole had screamed at him till he left again, and then Cole’s mom had screamed at him, because his dad hadn’t barely been home a day, and she wanted him there for some reason.
Cole didn’t get it.
But he went, because he hated it when his mom cried, and he knew he’d been wrong to yell at his dad - he knew he wasn’t supposed to do that.
They were supposed to be good, so the man would stay.
So he took the bus as far as it would go, through the parts of the city with parks and apartment buildings, and out into the area that was nothing but concrete and big trucks and even bigger buildings, and that was as far as the bus went, so he had to walk the rest of the way.
He knew when he was close, though, because there was one building that wasn’t just concrete. It was nice - it looked like the houses around that park in the middle of the city, and it was huge, like them, and there were all sorts of cars parked around it.
Nice cars.
Cole got lost, for a minute, staring at all the nice cars, trying to remember some of the names so he could tell his friends at school about them.
Finally, his winding path through the parking lot led him to the front door.
He knocked, but no one answered.
There weren’t any windows to peek through, either, and for a moment he was worried he’d got the address wrong - had mixed up the bus lines, maybe, or taken a wrong turn somewhere.
But then the door opened, and a tall, muscular man in a suit looked down at him.
“What the hell?” the man said.
Cole swallowed.
“Is Mr. Trenton here?” he asked, because his mother had made sure to remind him the people there wouldn’t know his father by dad.
“Who?” the man said.
Some kind of soft music was drifting through the open door, along with thin tendrils of the fog that clouded the inside of the building.
What little Cole could see of the interior was either dark wood, or a plush, velvety red.
“Ed Trenton,” Cole said, tearing his eyes away from the room to look back up at the man. “I’m his son. Is he here?”
The man stared down at Cole.
“Hold on,” he said finally, and shut the door in Cole’s face.
For a minute, Cole just stood there on the threshold.
Then, the door opened again.
“C’mon,” the man said, turning and walking away, and Cole sprang to life to follow him.
The thin hall of an entryway led into a large, open room, which was full of smoke, and that soft music, and a bunch more guys in suits who were drinking and talking and lounging around the tables and booths scattered across the floor.
There were some girls there, too.
They weren’t in suits.
They weren’t in anything, and Cole tried to keep his eyes on the path in front of him, because he knew he wasn’t supposed to look at girls like that.
He didn’t really know why - just that it was one of those rules all the adults insisted on.
The man led him to a door at the far end of the room, and then they were in a long wood paneled hallway.
He opened one of the doors to the side, at the very end, to reveal a small set of stairs.
“He’s down there,” the man said, and Cole didn’t really want to go down those stairs, but the man was just standing there, staring at him.
Waiting.
And - he had to be brave.
His mom needed him.
So he went down, making sure to hold onto the railing the whole way, because the stairs were steep. At the bottom was another room, and there was fog in there, too, and there wasn’t any music, but there were people talking.
Laughing, and calling out to each other.
Most of them wore similar clothes - they looked kind of like the ones on the G.I. action figures his friend Jason had gotten for Christmas last year.
There were a few in suits.
And there were a few, too, that weren’t in anything - they were girls, same as upstairs.
Cole didn’t know what to do.
He walked around, for a minute, and tried to look at the men and find his dad among them, and tried not to see the way they were touching the girls, because it seemed wrong.
Some of the girls weren’t totally naked.
But they weren’t wearing clothes like they should’ve been - they had, like, bracelets and necklaces, and they looked heavy, and Cole didn’t understand.
He was staring at one of them - whose eyes were red, and he knew what that meant, he’d seen it on his mother enough times - she was crying - when someone grabbed her arm, pulling her away, and behind her was his dad.
He was sitting at a table with several other men, some in suits, some in the cameo.
He had one of the girls sitting on his lap.
She was naked, just like all the rest, save those thick adornishments on her wrists, her ankles and neck, and Cole realized, then, that they were connected - they were like handcuffs, only they didn’t look anything like the ones he’d seen policemen use in the movies.
Cole’s father had one hand across her chest, holding her back against him by the neck, and the other was reaching down where she was sitting, down between her legs, and Cole realized, then, that his father’s pants were undone - he could see the skin of the man’s thighs.
Cole stared, frozen, for about five more seconds, and then he turned, and took off back up the stairs.
He slammed the door behind him, and just stood there, back against the heavy wood, trying to catch his breath.
He was staring hard at the ground, and he didn’t notice anyone approaching until there was a pair of shoes in front of him.
His head jerked up quickly, then.
The man standing there was probably around the same age as his father - maybe a little older. Cole couldn’t really tell. But, unlike his father, this man was slim - none of the broad, heavy muscle that Cole knew could pummel anyone into the ground.
Still, even without that, Cole felt a flash of fear run through him.
He couldn’t say why - only that the man seemed controlled, somehow - his movements almost hypnotically slow, and his eyes - it felt like he was staring straight through Cole.
He bent down, and then crouched, so his face was level with Cole’s.
“Hello,” he said.
“Hello,” Cole whispered back.
He realized, all of a sudden, that he was crying.
“I don’t think I’ve seen you here before,” the man said, tilting his head at Cole.
“‘S cause I’ve never been here before,” Cole mumbled.
“Well.” The man smiled softly at him. “That makes sense, then.”
Cole shrugged.
He was staring at the ground again - at the man’s shoes.
They looked nice.
Brown polished leather that narrowed to a point at the toes.
He probably drove one of those nice cars out front.
Cole wondered, suddenly, if the man would show him his car, if he asked.
He wasn’t going to - his dad would be pissed if he knew Cole had come around and bothered people at his work.
But it would be nice, he thought.
“Are you here with someone?” the man asked him.
He reached out at the same time - a knuckle under Cole’s chin - and pushed his head back up, so their gaze was level.
Cole swallowed.
“‘M here to get my dad,” he said. He didn’t really want to be looking the man in the eye - it still felt weird, like the guy had x-ray vision, except instead of Cole’s insides he was able to look at, like, his thoughts. But, for some reason, he couldn’t look away.
“I see,” the man said. “Can you tell me your father’s name?”
“Ed Trenton,” Cole said quietly.
“Ah,” the man said. “Of course. I can see the resemblance.”
Cole scowled at that.
He didn’t like it when people said he looked like his dad.
The man just smiled again.
“And what is your name?” he asked - his finger still pressed underneath Cole’s chin, so he couldn’t look down, or away.
“Cole,” Cole whispered.
“Well,” the man said. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Cole. How about I go find your father for you? And you can just wait right here.”
He let his hand drop, finally, and Cole nodded, wiping his sleeve across his eyes, his nose.
He really didn’t want to go back down those stairs.
“Alright,” the man said, standing straight.
Cole stumbled to the side, so the man could get to the door. He opened it, and was about to step down onto the stairs.
“Wait,” Cole said.
The man turned, one eyebrow lifted in question.
“What - um, what’s your name?” Cole asked.
Just in case he ever got to come again, and maybe next time he’d be brave enough to ask about the man’s car.
The man smiled at him once more.
“Why don’t you call me Al,” he said.
And disappeared down the stairs.
Cole’s dad was pissed.
It wasn’t Cole’s fault - it’s not like he had gone and searched the man out.
He’d come up to Cole.
But apparently he was the boss or something, and Cole’s dad had yelled at him for bothering the guy, and yelled at him for showing up at all, and Cole hated him.
He didn’t even want to go back there, there was no reason for his dad to forbid it.
He did think about it sometimes, though.
Mostly about all the nice cars.
His friend Jason at school had called him a liar, when he told him he’d see a real Jaguar, and sometimes he thought about going back and taking a picture, just to prove it.
But he wasn’t allowed, and his dad had only been getting meaner, whenever he was home, and his mom was already sick so much - he didn’t want to do anything to hurt her more.
He didn’t go back to that place until after his dad’s funeral.
The man had died there - had gotten into some fight or something, and had died right there in the building, before the ambulance even got there.
Cole wasn’t exactly torn up about it.
But his mom was - she hadn’t stopped crying since it happened, although she was stony faced by the time they arrived for the wake.
It was the same as Cole remembered - smokey and soft music and a loud murmur of background conversations. Only, this time, there weren’t any naked girls, and almost everyone was in a suit.
His mom was one of the only women there.
And he couldn’t smell very well - not really, not like some of the others in his class, who even at eleven were starting to develop some of their secondary gender characteristics.
Everyone said he’d be a beta, since he hadn’t shown any signs of anything else.
He wasn’t torn up about that, either.
He didn’t want to be an alpha - didn’t want to be angry all the time, and rude, and stupid, and too big - like his dad and every other alpha he’d ever met.
And - well, no one wanted to be an omega.
So, he was fine with being a beta - he was actually happy about the idea, and he didn’t care about not being able to smell, for the most part.
Except, sometimes, he could still smell - when an adult was feeling extra strong about something.
And right now, in this building, surrounded by all these men, his omega mother was afraid.
So afraid that even he, an unpresented kid, could smell it on her.
He stood in front of her the whole time, trying to ignore how tight her hands were clenched into his shoulders, refusing anytime someone offered him food, or something to drink, because he didn’t want to have a single reason to step away from his mom.
Her fear was so strong he could smell it spike every time someone approached them.
They mostly talked to her - offered their condolences, their charity.
If you ever need anything, they said, we’re here for you.
She always clenched his shoulders harder, when they said that.
He didn’t understand why, really - except that he knew his dad had always hated it when people tried to offer them charity.
He hadn’t ever realized his mom hated it that much, too.
But she was clearly upset, and he didn’t get why they had to be here at all - they could just leave, if she hated it so much.
Adults could do whatever they wanted, right?
But she just stood there, scared and still, while all the men in their suits stopped by to talk to her.
At some point she leaned over and whispered into Cole’s ear that she wanted to go to the restroom, and he walked back with her, and stood outside the door, leaning back against the wall while he waited, hands shoved in his pockets.
It couldn’t have been more than a few seconds after she’d gone through the door that someone was walking up to him.
He tensed, at first, but then he saw who it was.
Al, the man had said to call him, and Cole swallowed, eyes going wide, because he knew, now, that he was the boss - he owned the whole freaking place.
“Hello, Cole,” he said, and Cole’s eyes went even wider, because - the guy remembered him.
He remembered Cole’s name.
“H - hello,” Cole said quietly.
He froze, when the man reached out, and laid a hand on Cole’s shoulder.
He leaned down - Cole was a little taller, now, than the last time he’d been here, so the man didn’t have to crouch fully to meet his eyes.
“I’m sorry about your father,” the man said.
Cole shrugged, looking down at the floor.
The man let out a considering hum.
“How is your mother doing?” he asked.
Cole’s mouth thinned.
“She’s upset,” he said quietly.
“Understandable,” the man said.
It looked like he was about to say something else, but right then the door opened, and Cole’s mother was there.
She froze in the doorway.
The man straightened slowly.
“What - what are you doing?” Cole’s mom said, reaching out at the same time to yank Cole back against her.
“Ms. Trenton,” the man - Al - said. “I’m terribly sorry for your loss.”
“Why are you talking to him?” Cole’s mother hissed. Cole frowned - he hated it when adults talked about him like that - like he wasn’t even there.
The man’s expression didn’t falter. He was watching Cole’s mother closely, head tilted slightly, an obvious look of pity on his face.
“I apologize,” he said. “I was merely offering my condolences.”
“Don’t - ”
Cole frowned, looking over his shoulder at his mother.
Her voice was shaking.
“Don’t talk to him,” she said, and even though there was a tremor in her voice, she sounded steadfast.
Something in the man’s eyes flashed - some hint of an expression.
But, Cole couldn’t tell what it was, and the man didn’t act on it.
He simply said, “I apologize,” again, with a small nod of his head.
For a moment, there was just silence - none of them moved.
Then Cole’s mom nudged him, and he stepped forward.
The man didn’t move at all - so they had to side step, a little, to get past him out into the hall.
They were almost back to the main room when the man spoke again.
“Ms. Trenton,” he called out, and Cole’s mom froze once more, her hand clenching in the meat of his shoulder so hard he had to grit his teeth.
He could sense her looking back over her shoulder, and he turned, too, peeking behind her, back down the hall at the man.
“Your husband was a loyal employee of mine for years,” the man said. He began to walk toward them as he spoke - slowly, so slow it almost felt like he wasn’t moving at all. “I take care of my employees. Even those with… bad habits. I often set aside money, before paying them, to ensure they’ll have some savings left behind - exactly for moments like this.”
He was almost in front of them now - close enough that when he reached inside the pocket of his suit jacket, pulling out a small envelope and holding it out to them - it was within arm’s reach.
“I’ll have future payments sent along to your address,” he said. “A modest stipend, I know, but it’s something. And - should you ever need anything - anything at all - I hope you know you can always come to me.”
Cole pressed his hand over his mother’s, because she was digging so hard into his shoulder, now, that he thought her nails might tear through the fabric.
She let out a tiny noise - it almost sounded like the noises she made when she was crying.
Then she reached out, and snatched the envelope from the man’s outstretched hand.
He smiled.
Cole’s mother began to push them both forward again, but before Cole could look away, the man caught his eye, and, ever so slightly, nodded to him.
For whatever reason, Cole didn’t feel so bad about leaving the place after that.