Page 27 of Shifter Omegaverse AU

“The day we met, it was like getting tunnel vision,” she’d once said. “The whole world narrowed down to the size of his broad shoulders and dorky, lovestruck smile. I knew in an instant that we were both royally and utterly screwed.”

As Rowan selected a random song, and Milo turned it on, he wasn’t sure if this thing he was building with Milo was anything like that. And yet…

When Milo began swaying back and forth to the music, and his hawk bobbed his head in time, he thought he might also be royally and utterly screwed.

Rowan: Thank you for getting dinner with me, and for paying. We seem to have somehow flipped who picks and who pays, but as long as that’s okay with you it’s okay with me. I’m happy to do anything you mentioned at dinner for our next hangout.

Rowan debated hitting send on his phone all the way from the lobby up to his floor of the apartment building. As the doors opened, he decided to hell with it and pressed send. If Milo actually chose skydiving for their next hangout, they would just have to have a discussion beforehand.

It wasn’t that Rowan was opposed to skydiving. He’d done it twice with his ma, but he had to do it with a special service that understood he would be shifting mid-jump. It was nearly impossible for him and his family not to shift when exposed to speeding winds and the vast expanse of the sky. Rowan had to be careful with rollercoasters and high balconies as well.

While it might not be the case for all avian shifters, the Rangecroft family had spent a lot of time in their shifted forms. Their moms always encouraged them to shift as often as they liked, regardless of inconvenience or circumstance. That had probably been the best part of his childhood.

He had often felt ostracized and distant from his siblings and parents, but when they were shifted, Riley also didn’t like being touched. Raina, Ma, and Mom would groom each other and sleep curled up in the giant nest in their backyard tree, but Riley and Rowan had built their own nests. Ruben also had his own nest, but that was because his bird was so active their moms had insisted he have his own space to burn off his energy.

Perhaps that was why the three of them had all ended up living in apartment buildings so close together. They liked to be close to but not on top of each other. He would often run into Ruben on the sidewalk when he went for morning runs and Ruben was on his way home from wherever he’d been all night. He saw Riley much less frequently, but they actually had plans to meet for brunch the following morning. Usually, when she was the one to extend the invitation, it meant she either had business to discuss or their moms had been bugging her to “actually see your siblings you live next door to.” Given that their omega mom had been much more active in their family group chat, nudging Rowan twice to go see Ruben in the past month, he figured it was the latter.

Speaking of, Rowan let out a large sigh as he reached his apartment door and found it unlocked. He braced himself, taking a long breath in, holding for two, and then letting it out, just like he did before walking into a board meeting or stakeholder negotiation.

“You’re out of sparkling water,” Ruben said from his spot on Rowan’s couch.

He was drinking Rowan’s last can of sparkling water with his legs thrown haphazardly up on the coffee table.

“Hm, that’s weird, because I wasn’t out this morning,” Rowan said, dropping his keys and wallet on the small table near the door. He took his time removing his jacket and toeing off his shoes. Ruben’s eyes tracked him around the room, but neither brother said anything until Rowan sat down on the other side of his couch, cracking open a bottle of plain water.

“Where were you?” Ruben asked, taking a large swig of his stolen drink.

“Sorry, I missed the part where I had to ask your permission to go out with my friend.”

Ruben let out a loud burp. “Sorry, I missed the part where you had friends other than us.”

Rowan sank into the back of the sofa, debating whether or not to finally tell Ruben about Milo. Raina already knew, thanks to Troy, and he had been planning on telling Riley in the morning. It just wasn’t the sort of thing he and Ruben usually talked about. Most of the time, they were too busy discussing Ruben’s next concert or his latest fling. That had always served them well since Rowan never had much to talk about anyway, but now that he finally did, he wasn’t sure where to start.

Because Ruben was right. For most of Rowan’s life, his only friends had been his siblings. Growing up, Ruben had been his best friend, his confidant, and even sometimes his protector. Sure, they’d gotten on each other's nerves, and Ruben had acted out in ways that often made Rowan uncomfortable, but they had loved each other fiercely.

Things changed in high school. Ruben was recruited for their city’s orchestra right before his sixteenth birthday, and as his free time disappeared, so too did his friendship with Rowan.

The beginning of the end had been the night of Rowan's national chess championship. Yes, he knew how ridiculous that sounded, but at the time, it had been the most important thing in Rowan’s world. His clubmates didn’t care about his aversion to touch, and they were around more than his parents and siblings combined. Historically, the team had been quite bad, never progressing past the local competitions, let alone regionals or nationals. If they didn’t start producing some results, the team was set to lose its sponsorship, so Rowan had thrown himself into building up the team, practicing nearly every day while teaching the other club members—and it had actually paid off. They began winning, first locally, then statewide, and finally at the national level. His parents hadn’t been able to make any of the lesser competitions, but after Rowan’s repeated requests, they committed to being in town for the championship match.

Rowan could still feel the way that elusive pride had swirled inside his chest. He wasn’t like his older siblings. He wouldn’t be showing in an art gallery by twenty-two like Raina, starting a business by twenty like Riley, or joining an orchestra by sixteen like Ruben, but he had this…except it still wasn’t enough.

Obviously, Ruben hadn’t meant to sprain his wrist the same night as Rowan’s competition. He had just been sneaking into the principal violist or bassist or whatever’s third-story bedroom window and fallen. For any other teenage boy, this would have meant wrapping it in ice and going about his day, but that wouldn’t do for the up-and-coming best cellist on the East Coast.

His moms had flown into a panic, rushing out to take Ruben to the ER before Rowan’s team even stepped onto the competition stage. Despite the disruption, Rowan still managed to win second place, only to learn later that week that the club would still be losing its sponsorship the following year.

Ruben never apologized or even acknowledged what he’d done. His parents hadn’t said anything, either. They were far too preoccupied ferrying Ruben from one hand specialist to another, trying to get him back into tip-top shape to go off to his performing arts conservatory that fall.

No one noticed as Rowan slipped into the background at school, his one true interest and only source of pseudo-friends gone. His parents were barely home that year, visiting their other three kids across the country and pursuing their other ventures. When high school graduation arrived, his moms were so tired of their children’s school events that they didn’t ask what day it was, and Rowan didn’t offer. He collected his diploma and put it away in the back of his closet next to his abandoned chess set.

His relationship with Ruben never quite returned to how it was when they were kids. Throughout their years in college, the two of them stumbled through awkward visits home for the holidays until, slowly, they both stopped going home. Rowan ended up living with Riley as she finished her MBA, and Rowan worked on his bachelor's in economics. She was actually the one who created the family group chat and pushed Ruben and Rowan to talk to each other again.

When Ruben made the surprising choice to move back to the city, Rowan had been in such a dark place, he’d forgiven any and all past transgressions, genuinely just happy to have his brother back. Over the past several years, they’d rebuilt their relationship into something solid, if sometimes a bit bothersome.

Case in point, Rowan was pretty sure he saw flecks of dried mud on his coffee table underneath Ruben’s boots.

His hawk bobbed his head, and he found himself channeling Milo and their easy bluntness.

“I met someone,” Rowan said.