Diwa told him about a dog his family had owned in Manila called Boyet who had eaten a chess piece once and had shit it right back out with no problems. Colin told him about MrSingh’s daal, and what Mrs Singh did with cumin seeds that made it taste bloody incredible. Diwa got onto the subject of a particular kind of mango that only grew in the Pampanga region and had to be eaten standing over the sink because it was that juicy. Colin admitted he’d never had a mango that hadn’t come pre-sliced in a Tupperware from Sainsbury’s, and Diwa put both hands over his face in dismay.
Colin’s eyes closed somewhere around the bit where Diwa was explaining what a Mysore yoga class actually involved, and he meant to open them again in a moment…
Instead, he surfaced slowly, wrapped up in proper warmth. A blanket lay over him, heavy enough that he felt pleasantly held in place. The blanket smelled of Diwa. It was the same warm, clean alpha smell that had got into Colin’s head a fortnight ago and refused to leave since, only now it was banked in the soft wool against his cheek.
He turned his face into it and breathed in.
Then he registered that the blanket was heavier than any blanket had a right to be, and warmer in some places than in others. It rose and fell at a slow steady pace just under his ear.
His eyes drifted open and he saw that he was on Diwa’s chest, the soft grey cotton of his T-shirt rucked up where Colin’s cheek was pressed against him. Diwa’s arm was draped across Colin’s shoulders, with a hand resting easy in the dip between his shoulder blades. Colin had, at some point in the night, migrated the length of the sofa and tucked himself in under the alpha’s arm like a cat finding the warmest spot in the room.
He stayed very still.
He waited for it to come, the cold drop in the stomach, the lurch up his spine as his fear materialised. But it didn’t. There was only the quiet of the room and the slow rise and fall of Diwa’s chest under his cheek. Colin breathed him in deep, on purpose, taking in the scent of his sleep-warm skin.
His chest didn’t tighten. Instead, he shut his eyes again and let his cheek settle back into the dip of Diwa’s collarbone. He went on breathing.
He kept his palm where it was on Diwa’s chest and let himself wonder, just for a moment, if this was what other omegas woke up to. The simple fact of an alpha next to them, the pleasure of the weight of a solid body against his own.
This was dangerous, letting himself want a thing he had spent his entire adult life ignoring. He’d been all right. He’d taken his joy from Stephen and Lysander, two whole humans he’d grown out of his own body and somehow not made a complete mess of, and that had always been enough. He’d never let himself sit with the thought that there might have been room for more in his life.
Under his ear, Diwa’s breathing changed. His eyes opened, found Colin’s face, and he produced his ridiculous dimpled smile. There was no transition into consciousness for him. He went from sleeping to awake in the span of a single blink, eyes clear, no apparent grogginess.
Maybe the spirulina was worth gulping down every morning, if it got you up for the day like this, Colin thought with a flicker of envy, that people still on the right side of thirty had no idea what was coming for them.
“Morning,” Diwa said. His voice was a little rough at the edges. He lifted the hand that had been on Colin’s back and brought it round to Colin’s face. Before Colin had worked out what he was up to, Diwa swiped his thumb along the corner of Colin’s mouth.
“You’re a drooler,” he said, smirking.
Colin pressed the back of his own hand against his mouth and flushed.
Diwa laughed and sat up, pulling the blanket off both of them in one easy movement. He stretched his arms over his head. HisT-shirt rode up, and Colin made himself look at the side table with the wobbly leg.
“Right,” Diwa said, swinging his bare feet onto the floorboards. “Up you get. You’re coming to make breakfast with me.”
Colin sat up and dragged a hand through his hair. “I’m not having that green shit,” he said. “I’ve got work today.”
“No green shit.” Diwa was already on his feet, padding towards the kitchen on bare soles. “We’re making Tapsilog. It’s a proper Filipino breakfast. Beef, garlic rice, fried egg. You’ll be set up till dinner.”
“Right.”
Colin followed him through to the kitchen, scratching at the back of his neck. He didn’t let himself dwell on how he’d slept right next to Diwa. Properly slept, the way he hadn’t in years. He could feel it in the loose easy way his shoulders sat, and the fact that he wasn’t squinting crankily against the morning light.
“Apron’s on the hook.” Diwa pointed without looking up. “Garlic’s in the bowl on the counter. I need eight cloves peeled and minced. There’s a board and a knife. Off you go.”
Colin’s eyebrows lifted. “Eight cloves?”
“Eight.”
“For two people.”
“You’re right. We should really go for ten.”
Colin counted the cloves out. Eight fat ones, ignoring the request for ten, the papery skin coming off under his thumbnail. He set about mincing them while Diwa worked at the hob with a tray of beef strips that had been marinating in something dark and sweet-smelling.
He minced. The pile on the board grew. He scraped it to one side with the flat of the knife and looked at it.
“That’s the lot,” he said.
