Page 53 of Glitterati Omega

Rupert shook his head. “Just—I thought the stitches were out, so why …?”

Thandiwe shook a book at him. “Clumsy,” she muttered.

“He just had surgery, Mama,” Winston explained, petting the back of Rupert’s hand absently.

She shook her head as she straightened up. She said nothing else, but began piling the books in the corner, almost throwing them there. Rupert wanted to shrink into a hole. He was making a wonderful first impression, wasn’t he?

He got back to his feet and picked up a couple of books. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ll be more careful. I shouldn’t have tried to lift all of them at once.”

Thandiwe seemed satisfied with that. She picked up one last book, then walked back out of the room. Sandy carried a big stack of books by him. Winston was clearing some of the dishes, pushing them to one end of the table.

When they sat down to eat, Rupert tried to focus on the meal rather than the continued pain in his middle. There were plenty of people that he needed to learn names for, although nobody seemed remotely interested in talking to him. He wished they would. Maybe it would have been easier to distract himself from the pain. He was just overthinking it. It would fade as soon as he stopped giving it so much attention.

It was more distracting when they went to bed—on opposite sides of the large, single room that seemed to be a communal bedroom for children of all ages and genders—and Rupert tried to distract himself, desperately, but he couldn’t deny there was blood shortly after everything was dark and quiet.

He didn’t know what to do. It seemed silly to wake up the whole house—he was fairly certain that was what would happen if he asked one of the other omegas (Sandy, perhaps) or went to talk to Thandiwe. They were bound to find out in the morning anyway; he was certain he’d bled on the blankets.

So it was a question of whether he wanted the interrogation in the dark hours or in the morning. He decided to wait, in case it stopped, which he knew was wishful thinking. At any rate, it only made the case more undeniable; in the morning, the sheets were red and so was he.

When the light came in, he couldn’t stand lying down any longer, so he gathered up the ruined sheets and tiptoed out of the room, intent on maybe …

Burning the sheets, perhaps. He didn’t know where they had laundry. Did they have someone to do the laundry? Probably not. He remembered having to be taught how to do the washing. That was something they hadn’t taught him in college, but on his first mission withmsf, there hadn’t been much quibbling over who did which chores. Everyone had to pitch in, pull their weight—and so Rupert had learned to do laundry, just like he’d learned to cook.

He supposed he was better at laundry than cooking, because he’d been quickly removed from the kitchen rotation. They’d left him on the laundry rotation though.

Thandiwe was up. She lifted an eyebrow at him. “Ah,” he said, glancing over his shoulder. “I, um.”

She lifted both eyebrows. “The sheets need washing,” he said, averting his gaze.

He heard her snort. “Then you can go clean them, hm?” She grabbed a large basket off the top of the lopsided cupboards, then pointed into it. “The machines are down near the pond.”

“The pond,” he echoed.

She frowned at him, and he felt sufficiently cowed that he tossed the soiled sheets in the basket and took off, if only to avoid her gaze. He had sounded rather judgmental, even if he hadn’t meant it. He just … didn’t know where the hell the pond was. He didn’t recall having seen one when they were driving in.

He wandered about for a bit (the pond was more difficult to find than might have been indicated). It was well after sunrise by the time he located it, and there was already a long line for the little building he presumed functioned as some sort of laundromat. One omega had a basket on his head; two others seemed to be negotiating the sorting of their laundry, tossing things between two baskets. Others, apparently impatient, had taken to washing their laundry in the pond itself. Rupert peered at them for a moment, then decided he didn’t want to wait either. He had cramps; he wanted to go lie down. A couple of people raised eyebrows when he landed on his knees at the edge of the water, but no one said anything to him. The blood didn’t want to wash out.

He dropped the basket by the door when he got back. Both of Winston’s mothers—Thandiwe and Ndileka—were sitting on the bench at the table, Winston beside Ndileka.

“You were going to see the baby today,” Ndileka started without any prelude.

“That was the plan,” Winston said, and the three of them looked at Rupert.

“I think that is a bad plan,” Thandiwe said. She gave Rupert a level look.

“Why would it be a bad plan?” Winston asked, his brow furrowing.

Rupert waved a hand when he looked at him. “I can’t think of any reason,” he said, and Thandiwe’s glare increased tenfold. “You came all the way from Houston to visit the baby, and now you’re here, so why wouldn’t you?”

Thandiwe sniffed. “Perhapsyoudo not want to see the baby,” she said.

Winston shook his head. “I don’t believe you two,” he muttered. “There is no reason not to see the baby.”

Thandiwe looked at Rupert again for a very long moment, before she finally averted her gaze. Ndileka shrugged. “Fine. We’ll see if your sister feels up to it.”

“She should,” Winston said. “It’s been long enough.”

“It was a hard birth,” Thandiwe told him flatly. “Alphas do not get to judge when omegas are recovered.”