Omega Wanted: Bad Boy Mpreg Romance

by Stephan James

  Warm-up ended as abruptly as it began.

  Coach Graham blew short and sharp on his whistle, then clapped his hands in staccato bursts until the whole field was watching him. Every single one of the candidates gasped for breath, panting like dogs.

  “Five minutes of light exercise and you’re tired?” Graham glared around. A wave of recoils followed the path of his gaze. “You should all be ashamed! It doesn’t get any easier!”

  “Screw this!” someone shouted. The ginger-headed guy from before tore off his drenched jersey and threw it on the grass. “I don’t need this bullshit!”

  “We won’t miss you!” Cowboy waved goodbye. A pair of middle fingers waved in his direction, and then he was gone. Coach Graham waited a moment to see if anyone else would follow, watching like a hawk.

  The pretty guy twitched. Graham’s head snapped in his direction. A heartbeat flew by without any further incident, and Wish let out a breath he hadn’t known he was holding. For some reason, he felt proud of the little guy for sticking in there. He would never make it on the team; he didn’t seem to want to anyway, but at least it seemed like he wouldn’t fizzle out early.

  “If no one else is going to turn into a girl, get into four lines. Can you count to four? On the end zone. 40-yard dash. You’re going to be timed. Don’t screw it up ‘cause you won’t get a second chance.”

  As the lines formed and the staff members jogged towards the sidelines to find their clipboards and stopwatches, Wish took a spot where he could keep an eye on the little guy. He hated running with a passion. His position required strength and endurance. Speed, not so much. Studying the scrawny legs of the little guy, Wish didn’t hold out much hope for his new favorite candidate.

  He never could have known what would happen next.

  In fact, he blinked and missed it. One moment the runs were proceeding as smoothly as they could, pens scribbling rapid notes alongside the names of men who probably hadn’t had to run in months, and a dead silence blanketed the field by the next. The assistant coach manning the line stared blankly at the little guy, all the way down at the 40-yard mark, and then back down at his stopwatch. Wish peeked over his shoulder at the name listed there. Sammy. Sammy Roe.

  Even Graham looked baffled. “Do it again!” he demanded.

  As Sammy ran, he was a dark blur of motion. The small freshman tore up the grass beneath his sneakers as he ran, feet slapping down ungracefully as his legs churned too fast for the eye to track. He flashed back across the end zone, tripped over his own feet, and collapsed onto his hands and knees.

  “4.25,” the assistant coach with the stopwatch whispered in awe. “4.25 seconds.”

  Sammy wheezed, “Is that good?” He lisped very faintly, blurring syllables together into a mellow chain of softness. Wish bent over and patted his back, startling himself and his teammates. He looked at his hand; large enough to break this younger man in half, and then backed up out of the situation as gracefully as he could.

  “That’s professional. Better than a lot of professionals. Where the hell did you learn to run like that?”

  Wish almost reached out again as the smaller man fought for his balance, but he thought better of it. Staggering up and then studying the painted white lines so he wouldn’t have to meet the eyes of everyone watching him. Sammy just shrugged. “I just ran.”

  “Yeah,” Coach Graham echoed thoughtfully. “You sure did.” But are you going to let this spider beat you?” he shouted suddenly, and then gripped his whistle warningly. “Back to the drill, now! And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll beat his time!” An accusing finger flew out in Sammy’s direction, who just wore a bemused frown.

  No one beat Sammy’s time, not in the 40-yard dash. On the short-distance shuttle run however, Sammy placed almost dead-last. Wish watched closely, occasionally roaming around in a wide circle and making some noncommittal comment to anyone he passed, trying to appear uninterested. In reality, he was fascinated. Sammy sprinted terribly, unnaturally fast but he lacked the agility for dodging, and his body control was awful. He couldn’t catch to save his life, and his endurance was nowhere to be found. Like a cheetah, Wish mused, best suited for short bursts, but that wasn’t quite right; Sammy’s run resembled the frantic scamper of a panicking black spider, and by the time the first water break came around, the nickname was stuck.

  “Spider Sammy, huh?” Wish commented, trying to sound casual as he brought a cup of water to his lips. His hand engulfed the cup like a bear’s paw. Suddenly, feeling self-conscious, he lowered the cup again without drinking. “That was some of the best running I’ve ever seen.”

  “Thanks, I guess.” Sammy shrugged. Tendons stood out in his smooth legs, espresso muscles flexing as he shuffled nervously. “It’s not like it was good enough for anything.”

  Wish reached out and touched his shoulder, surprising them both. Automatically looking around to see if anyone saw that, he glimpsed Cowboy trying to motion him away from the candidates, and towards the rest of the actual team members. Wish waved the invitation away, subtly using it as an excuse to stop touching the younger man. His posture stayed the same however; one shoulder sloped down as if still being held there by a heavy hand.

  “So,” he said softly, running a hand through his short sun-bleached hair, “why are you even here?”

  Sammy flashed a startled smile with his even white teeth, but he had a heartbreakingly endearing gap between the top front two. “Are you allowed to ask me that?”

  “I’m just a volunteer.”

  “Uh-huh. Sure. What do you…uh. What do you play, I guess?”

  “Fullback.”

  A blank look met his proud words. He sighed. “It’s my job to protect little guys like you.”

  “Protect us from what?”

  Wish blinked. “You really don’t know football, do you? What, are you a gamer?”

  Sammy looked down at his empty cup. Bitten fingernails tapped a complex rhythm against the rim. “I said I didn’t know anything.”

  “Not to me, you didn’t.”

  “Not like it makes a difference who I talk to,” Sammy muttered. His fingers danced, drumming on plastic.

  “So why are you here, then?” Wish held his breath. Sammy’s thin face clenched, his jaw squaring stubbornly. Wish knew that look, having felt his own face contort in the exact same way on so many other occasions, but before he could say anything that damned whistle rang out again. Partly-revived walk-ons hustled toward Coach Graham, swallowing up Sammy and ferrying him along in the tide. Younger bodies parted around Wish’s bulk as he stood there, watching Sammy’s short ebony hair bob as he walked.

  I shouldn’t get involved, he thought. He shouldn’t get involved, but the sight of Sammy out there floundering in a situation where he simply couldn’t swim, a drowning insect, tugged on his heart. His own past still brought him pain though; no way could he handle the pressure of someone else’s. Broad as his shoulders were, he could only carry his own burden. Resolved to let this go, Wish turned his focus to the few candidates that he could see actually passing through Hell Week, and into the next round.

  No one was more surprised than he when, more than an hour later, as the first day came to an end; he leaned back against the dome’s welcome sign and waited for Sammy to drag by.

  “Hey,” he said.

  Sammy growled inaudibly.

  He said, “I said hey.”

  “What do you want?”

  “Do you want to talk, maybe?”

  Sammy jerked his head away. “Leave me alone,” he started to say, but an elbow thudded hard into the vulnerable space between his shoulder blades. Breathless, he tripped forward and stumbled over the waiting foot stuck out into his path.

  Reacting purely out of instinct, Wish swung out one tree-trunk arm and let the smaller man come to a stop against him. Drawing himself up to his full height, Wish stared down at a stout candidate with pouty lips. “What the hell was that?” he demanded.

  “Is there
a reason you’re being an ass?” Sammy started to speak again, but Wish cut him off, suddenly loathing that Cupid’s bow of a mouth. “Best answer is to just walk away. Now.”

  Ignoring everyone who gathered to watch, including a snickering Cowboy and a deadpan Head Coach, Wish pulled on Sammy’s arm and towed him towards his beat-up and rusting truck. The tires were bald, dents covering both fenders, and one headlight canted sideways in its socket; Sammy balked understandably, but Wish positioned him near the passenger side door.

  “You wanna wait here for your parents?” Wish asked politely, knowing the answer already.

  Sammy shook his pretty head from side to side.

  “Then get in.”

  Three blocks away, driving just to drive, Wish tried to relax his grip on the steering wheel. Sammy sat still and silent on the passenger side, full lips pressed together into a thin line of distaste. His arms were crossed, his back bowed. That posture pained Wish; the ache in his heart strengthened, making his hands tighten on the wheel again.

  “Got anywhere you wanna go, Spider Sammy?”

  Sammy let out a breathy, unamused laugh. “Pretty soon I might not have anywhere to go.”

  “Alright, you wanna explain that?”

  “Not really.” Sammy looked out the window as they passed a sparse group of palm trees. “I didn’t think football players were supposed to be smart.”

  “I’m majoring in Business.”

  “No way.”

  “Way. And fullbacks don’t tackle. I’m no use to anyone if I crack my head open when I’m supposed to be protecting.”

  “Protecting little guys.”

  “Right. Like you. Where do you live? I’ll drop you off. Or are you homeless? Is that it?”

  “What? No!”

  Wish drew up to a stop sign, pausing extra-long and pretending to be cautious, trying to prolong their time together for even a few more seconds. “You know, you’re not the first guy to not get along with their folks. Half those guys there at the tryouts were just there because their parents wanted them to be. It’s not the end of the world to disappoint someone else if you’re doing it for yourself.” The engine wheezed in protest as he touched the gas again, wobbling the whole interior.

  They passed the House of Heat, the Sun Devil football stadium. Sammy shrugged and turned away from the sight. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “So tell me, then.”

  “My dad is John Roe.”

  Something clicked suddenly. John Roe was a well-to-do local businessman and a benefactor of ASU. Wish hadn’t been aware he had a son but now he supposed he could see why, when Sammy resembled the exact opposite of everything Roe stood for.

  “Damn, that’s rough. So what, he forced you into the tryouts?”

  Sammy gave that breathy laugh again. Wish thought he felt his heart skip. “Worse. Dad bribed the Head of Athletics to get me a spot in the tryouts. I’ve never played a sport in my life but now he wants me to. He said I have to make it in or else he won’t help put me through college like he said he was going to.”

  A lot of people got by without that help, but Wish understood it wasn’t so much the money, but a desire to earn his father’s approval.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to just tell you all that. It’s not like we’ll see each other again after this week. You can take me home now. I live…”

  “What if we go to the park?”

  “What park? Why would we do that?”

  “Maybe…” Wish shifted in his seat, struggling to remember how to drive while his thoughts whirled around him like blasts of rain obscuring the windshield. “Maybe I want to help you. I’ll help you get through tryouts.”

  “I don’t know what kind of wizard you think you are man, but that couldn’t happen even if we had longer than a week. But it doesn’t matter, because stuff like that doesn’t just happen in a week.”

  “Aloysius. My name is Aloysius. You can call me Wish, if you want. Everyone does. Or not. That’s fine.” His thoughts still racing, Wish quickly ran through the twisting maze of turns he’d taken since exiting the football field parking lot, and turned his truck in the direction of a small neighborhood park not too far away. “Anyway, I was watching you.”

  “Watching me?”

  “Watching everyone,” Wish hastily corrected himself, heat rising up his neck. “That’s why I was there, anyway. But, I mean, everyone was watching you after you did your run. That was amazing. But you had problems with the other stuff, right? I can help with that. Most of that stuff in the warm-up is all about form. I can show you what to do.”

  “You can’t make me stronger in a week.”

  “No, but that would come later. The basics set you up for that.”

  “Wait!” Sammy suddenly slapped his hand against the dashboard. The glove compartment fell open, whacking him across the knee. “Ouch! But wait. I still don’t want to play at all, remember? I don’t want to do this.”

  When Wish spoke next, his voice was as heavy as his hand. “Sometimes, that’s just how things are, Sammy.”

  Silence fell between them, not quite companionable, but less than uncomfortable, until they passed through a busy intersection. The world fell away somehow, opening up into a quaint neighborhood where each house had at least one palm tree and most showed signs of childhood life, discarded bikes or footballs laying abandoned in front yards. Someone had lost their Frisbee on the roof of a house, a bright splash of scarlet against homely brown shingles. Sammy sat up a little straighter, something akin to a genuine smile flitting on and off his face like silver fish through sunlight. Somewhere, a dog barked. Somewhere, a mother called out an indistinct question and was answered by a flurry of little voices all chiming together. Compared to the bustling activity of the university, this lively neighborhood was as close to peace as one could find in a college town.

  The park was nothing special, a few plots of dying grass rimmed with deliberately-planted lines of trees. A playground occupied one plot, a miniature football field the next. The road turned to gravel as Wish pulled into a slanting parking space. “Here we are!” he announced, forcing cheerfulness. Training Sammy would be no easy task, but his mind was racing, quickly running through a list of what could be worked on, what stood a chance of being improved with such an imposing time limit. With any luck, Wish might finally have a chance to apply all the little hints and cheats he stockpiled throughout the years, in order to take care of himself when no one else would. His pointless treasure trove of knowledge, which held nothing of value for his teammates or coaches, might finally pay off, and it all would start right there in the middle of a neglected field, painted numbers faded beyond recognition.

  This field belonged to the innocent youth leagues, to overworked middle-aged men seeking respite from their office jobs. This field held the barest shreds of glory dreams from the past, and the glimmering spark of purpose emerging from deep within a child’s bright eyes. Come game time, the few bleachers would be packed and the white markings renewed to crisp, clean perfection.

  In other words, the perfect informal atmosphere.

  Sammy looked around uncertainly, stepping lightly on the grass. “Is this really okay?” He looked around, obviously self-conscious.

  “Of course it is. I come here all the time and no one pays any attention to me.” That wasn’t quite true. Few lonely housewives could resist the sight of a muscular young man stretching in the sunlight, but he could only hope they would leave him alone this time when they saw he was with someone.

  “I’m not sure how to do this.”

  “I’ll teach you,” Wish said. “We’ll start with some stretches.” He immediately bent into a slide, stretching one leg out straight and sharply bending the other. “Rock from side to side,” he said, pressing exaggeratedly low and slow. “Tighten your hamstrings and your…groin, and then relax when you switch over. Everything goes much better when you start out loose.”

  After watching for a moment, Sammy b
ent into the stretch, awkwardly. Wish kept rocking slowly, shifting over a step every few repetitions to stay dynamic and fluid. After a couple seconds of painful grimacing on Sammy’s part, he stood up straight again and moved over. “Don’t move,” he said, and slid one hand along Sammy’s back, pressing him forward; at the same time, he used the heel of his other hand to straighten and adjust the line of the younger man’s body.

  “Ow!” Sammy protested, trying to rise. Wish kept him pressed down low, holding him there. “Stop, that hurts my…”

  “Of course it hurts. But does it really?” Holding Sammy’s shoulders now, Wish swayed him over to the other side and began the same adjustments. “Your body isn’t used to it, but it’s just strain. We want tight, then loose. Like firing an arrow. You ever do archery in gym?” Rocking slowly back to the other side.

  “Wasn’t any good at it.”

  “Bet you were amazing on running the mile, though.”

  Sammy laughed and pressed against Wish’s broad hands, starting to move on his own. Not as deep, but better than before. “Everyone thought I cheated somehow.”

  “And you never tried out for track?”

  Cautiously, but regretfully, Wish slowly pulled his grip away and backed up. Sammy’s face was dark with concentration, but even when his laughter faded the smile clung as an afterthought. He looked almost cute, with his butt stuck out and his head bent forward.

  “And encourage my dad? No.”

  Wish looked around everywhere but at that small, round butt and the tight hips. “It’s really a shame. You’ve got a talent, but no one saw it until now.”

  “Hard work beats talent,” Sammy quipped, and then shrugged, breaking his stance. “That’s what dad says, anyway.”

  Put them both together and you would be unbeatable, Wish thought sadly.

  Moving on, Wish lifted his right knee up high and hugged it to his chest, rising up on the point of his toe before stepping back down and alternating to the left. Sammy mimicked more readily this time but stayed static, high-stepping in the same place. “Walk forward a little when you do that,” Wish said, and came around behind Sammy. “Keep going. Do it again.” This time, as Sammy rose up and started to drop back down, Wish grabbed his waist and shuffled him forward. Sammy tensed in his grip, landing awkwardly as his whole body went stiff.