Page 18 of Shifter Omegaverse AU

“Thank you,” Rowan said, and Milo nodded at the muffin, as if that was what Rowan had meant.

They ate in silence, Rowan carefully avoiding the parts that had touched Milo’s mouth. Milo seemed to have no such qualms, biting directly into the part of the muffin Rowan had eaten from.

“Gods, it feels nice to just sit in the grass,” Milo said, before taking a large drag from the hot coffee.

“It really is nice. Although it might seem counterintuitive for a bird, my hawk and I really like walking and sitting in the grass. It feels…grounding.”

Milo took another sip of the coffee, making a happy-sounding noise in the back of their throat before popping the lid off with their thumb. They offered Rowan the now semi-open cup, and Rowan accepted it, handing over the iced drink in return.

“I don’t know if it’s grounding for me and my pony,” Milo said, placing the remainder of their muffin on the ground and rummaging through the bag. They pulled out the second straw, shoved it in the drink, and then took out what Rowan thought might be a raspberry muffin. “Right now, my pony is cantering around in excited, very not-grounded circles.”

Milo rolled their head on their neck as if to demonstrate the circles, and Rowan’s hawk imitated the motion with his head. There was something oddly familiar about the movement, and it took Rowan several sips of the hot coffee to figure out what it was.

Birds and bird shifters didn’t experience heats or ruts. Instead, their hormonal cycles followed seasonal changes, such as shifts in daylight hours and temperature. When he was a kid, Rowan hadn’t picked up on the fact that at the beginning of every spring, he and his siblings would get shipped off for a weekend to go visit one of their sets of grandparents. It wasn’t until he was fifteen and began experiencing his own hormonal shifts that he worked up the courage to ask his moms why his hawk kept bobbing his head in erratic ways. His moms had given each other that look they did every time he said something that showed just how different he was from his siblings.

“Your sisters and brother haven’t had this talk with you yet?” his omega mom had asked.

“Aunt Gloria talked to me about it when I was way too young,” his alpha ma said with a derisive snort.

Rowan shook his head, ready to take back the question and never ask again, when his omega mom placed her hand right next to Rowan’s, the warmth of her pinky just barely reaching his thumb. She was a very tactile person, often placing a hand on Ma’s back or his sibling’s shoulders. This hand placement was as close as they could get, but it was special in its own way because it was just for them.

“That’s okay, sweetie,” she had said. “We’ll show you.”

They invited him into the backyard and warned him they were going to shift. He’d averted his eyes as they stripped and shifted, and by the time he looked back, his ma was doing some sort of dance, rocking her body and her wings as her head bobbed up and down. His omega mom started doing the same dance, mirroring her much larger mate.

When Ma launched into the sky, his mom followed, and they flew around each other in huge circles and glorious arcs. He’d only stayed to watch for a few minutes before he’d seen all he needed to see. This was their mating dance, and they must have done it for each other every year right around that time, sending their kids away so they could have some privacy for it and whatever came afterward that even as an adult Rowan preferred not to acknowledge.

As Milo began to hum a very out-of-tune melody, their head continuing to swivel and sway, Rowan’s hawk matched the movement almost exactly.

Rowan tipped his face up to the sky, catching the rays from the late spring sun, and reminded himself—and his hawk—that he had already gone through his hormonal spike that year. He’d gone to the cabin he owned an hour outside of town and spent the weekend flying around in his shifted form and taking care of himself in his human form with a few toys and some of his favorite steamy books.

His hawk steadfastly ignored him, continuing to bob his head, adding a few flaps of his wings for good measure. Was Rowan finally going to see the mating dance his hawk supposedly knew innately? Rowan was an atrocious dancer as a human, but his moms had assured him that when the time was right, and he met the right person, his hawk would know what to do.

Milo let out a happy-sounding squeal as they set down the raspberry muffin with only a small bite taken out of it and pulled out the next muffin that smelled distinctly of apples and cinnamon. They turned to smile up at Rowan, and just like in the coffee shop, they both leaned in towards each other.

Once again, Rowan wasn’t sure if the specks of green in Milo’s eyes were a reflection of the grass below them or just a quirky feature of a quirky shifter. Either way, Rowan thought they were gorgeous, just like the smile Milo was giving him. It wasn’t as wide as usual, but there was something private in it. A promise, or a secret, or—

Milo’s leg shifted, or maybe Rowan’s did, but suddenly their pants legs brushed, and Rowan’s hawk startled out of his head bobbing. He fluttered his wings uncertainly, and reality crashed back in around Rowan.

He tried to cover up his flinch by reaching for the bag and pulling out the final muffin, but when he sat back up, Milo had pulled several inches away. They didn’t look bothered by the adjustment. In fact, they looked pleased as can be as they crammed half the apple muffin in their mouth, but Rowan was unsettled. He shook his head firmly, as if he could dispel the image of his hawk and put an end to thoughts of dances and mates.

That sort of thing wasn’t meant for someone like him. Milo had explicitly said they were a cuddly person, and Rowan had seen proof of that in the way they were with Ray. On top of that, they were so loud and vibrant, full of joy and excitement that Rowan had never come anywhere near close to experiencing.

No. Silly thoughts of fated mates and courtship dances were best left for his eldest sister and mothers. He would just try to enjoy a nice evening in the park, filled with muffins and the brief, understanding looks Milo kept giving him.

6

Author’s note:

While writing this book, my mom received a terminal cancer diagnosis. I figured the grief Milo was experiencing wouldn’t be the same as mine but might be cathartic to write given everything happening in my life.

It wasn’t until halfway through this chapter, when Milo stares up at the sky, that I realized I’m still processing my dad’s death from almost three years ago. His death also kicked off a gender journey for me. It wasn’t the same as Milo’s, but it’s where this idea that grief can do wild things to our identity comes from.

Milo

“So did you kiss the very handsome, large, ginger man, or just stuff your face with muffins?” Ethel asked as she ran a brush through Milo’s mane.

“I’m pretty sure he just stuffed his face with muffins,” Ray said, from where he was sitting on the ground, polishing one of Milo’s hoofs.