Chapter Text
On the phone, Seokjin’s alpha mother sounds delighted. “The whole pack is coming over for dinner Friday. Oh, we haven’t been the whole pack together in such a long time.”
Seokjin knows that all too well for he expressly dodges any form of gathering that isn’t absolutely necessary.
He’s not being subtle about it either.
It’s his youngest cousin’s presentation, though, and the whole Kim pack must celebrate the coming of yet another omega amongst them.
“You will be there, right?” his mother wants to confirm. “Tell me you’ll be there.”
“Of course, I won’t.”
“Seokjin,” she says sternly. A warning. “When I say all the pack, it includes you, also. You’re still part of my pack.”
“Unfortunately,” Seokjin says under his breath.
This sends his mother into a rant, brushing subjects he so desperately wants to avoid. “You know how I worry about you,” she probably feels obliged to say because of the weird way she shows she cares. “Being thirty, and a lone omega… estranged from your own pack… it’s not healthy.”
It’s the poorly concealed pity in her voice that pushes Seokjin to finally snap. “I’m not lonely,” he says, and that’s technically not a lie. He’s got Yoongi, a perfectly fine omega best friend whom he would never deny over any stupid alpha out there.
“Unmated is what I meant,” his mother corrects, all patience gone from her tone.
Seokjin’s been juggling a love-hate relationship with the word unmated. A dilemma of the soul. On the one hand, being an independent omega, navigating the world, earning a living and standing his ground all by himself makes him feel proud.
On the other hand, unmated has been thrown his way as an insult too often not to hurt anymore. As if not having accepted a suitable mate yet makes him a lesser omega for it.
“It’s not like you don’t have many suitors lining up left and right,” she barrels on. “I know many young alphas who would be hono—“
“It doesn’t matter,” Seokjin cuts, angry now. Every year it’s the same song. Every year he ends up coerced into a minimum of two atrocious blind dates with pompous alpha sons of alpha dads who treat Seokjin like he’s just a prize and not the entire goddamn race.
“Of course, it does!”
“No. It doesn’t,” Seokjin says, and because he does not want to hear this song again—he just can’t—he decides to lie. “It doesn’t matter because I’m already mated.” He instantly wants to bite on something. His own tongue, maybe.
Silence at the other end of the line. “…Who-Why am I just hearing of this?”
Scrambling for a way to anchor his lie, Seokjin thinks of all the available alphas he knows; his boss (old), his landlord (nope and nope), Hoseok (…Yoongi would kill him). Then a glimpse of hope, a fluttering light in the distance. “Haven’t I told you I’ve been dating my neighbour?”
Outrageous is what this is.
The neighbour in question, Jungkook, is decidedly not the worst as far as alphas go. He’s young, for one, and he’s sweet. Sometimes even helps Seokjin carry his extensive groceries up to their floor. Polite and helpful, treating Seokjin with respect despite their difference in status.
They’ve certainly never been dating, though. Forget about mating.
“You’re mated?” she asks, confused and cautious, sounding so disbelieving Seokjin feels like he should be offended.
But it’s fine. Seokjin never shared much with his mother in the first place. Maybe it’s the result of having an alpha mother (Seokjin has read about it somewhere). Maybe it’s just the rift in the way they see the world that keeps their relationship so distant. At the end of the day, Seokjin doesn’t want her sniffing around his personal stuff with all of her alpha judgement.
“Jung-kook,” Seokjin enunciates. Just for show. “Young, cute, healthy as all hell—of course I said something about him.” It’s all utter bullshit now. Of fucking course Seokjin hasn’t mentioned Jungkook to her. Why would he?
“Kim Seokjin, are you telling me that you’ve finally come to your senses? Are my ears hearing this right?” and her tone is so hopeful, filled with barely concealed relief, yet Seokjin feels gross.
“It’s not a big deal. Don’t make it a big deal.”
“Of course, it’s a big deal! Oh, your father will be so happy. We have to meet this young alpha, now–tell me you plan on introducing him to us.”
Good time for Seokjin to start rethinking this whole plan. And what even was the plan exactly? Did he think he would appease her just by spouting nonsense about finally being mated? Did he think he would be able to get away with it without owing her some details? His nosy, pack leader, alpha mother?
Stupid.
Seokjin readjusts the grip on his phone and nervously clears his throat. “Listen, mom,” he says carefully. “I don’t think–”
“You will bring him to your cousin’s presentation,” she says, interrupting with a tone that suggests a pack leader’s order much more than a simple mother’s request. “You will bring him and introduce him to the pack.”
There is no denying that tone.
Worst-case-scenario mode activated. A terrible, terrible plan rapidly forms in Seokjin’s way-too-creative brain.
He’s going to have to make this work somehow.
“Yes, mother,” he hears himself answer.
Shit.
***
“You want us to pretend like we’re mated,” Jungkook repeats mechanically, formidably confused. “In front of your whole pack?”
Seokjin nods, stern. “Yes.”
They’ve been standing in Jungkook’s doorway, Seokjin blurting the entirety of his crazy plan while getting (objectively adorably) redder by the minute. He’s clutching a plastic container, shuffling from one foot to the other, and looking everywhere except in Jungkook’s direction.
“Pretend,” Jungkook repeats, testing the surreal idea out loud, trying to make sense of it. “How?”
“I have a plan,” Seokjin assures him, seemingly not picking up on Jungkook’s total state of brainrot. “Look, I know it sounds like a lot, but, really, it’s just for one night. I’ll owe you, I promise.”
Jungkook can’t find the words to reply. He can’t reply. He just can’t because, honestly, this thing sounds a lot like his wildest dream and his worst nightmare wrapped up into one. Only yesterday was he still trying to gather all of his courage to ask his beautiful omega neighbour out, and now today–
“Please, Jungkook.”
Seeing the way Seokjin bites the inside of his cheek hard, seeing the way it costs him to step all over his pride like this makes Jungkook hitch to accept promptly (and give him absolutely everything else he’s ever wanted, really) but he still needs to know. “Why?”
Seokjin squirms again on his feet. “Oh, come on.” He pushes the plastic container towards Jungkook. “I made you kimchi fried rice.”
And, okay. Food. But still. “Tell me why you need us to do this,” Jungkook insists. He likes to think he’s not a pushy alpha, but some intel is hard to do without.
A sigh. “I just want them off my case, that’s all.” A pause. “If they think I’m mated to a decent alpha then they’ll give me a break.”
“But there’s nothing wrong with you not wanting to mate.”
The comment rewards Jungkook with a look. It’s the first time Seokjin makes eye contact since Jungkook answered the door. “I know that.”
Doesn’t change the fact that he’s here, on Jungkook’s doorstep, courting him with food and pleading for a fake mate. Jungkook frowns. “Why did you choose me?”
Looking utterly relieved by the change in subject, Seokjin explains, “I had a very small window for improvisation and you’re the first available, decent alpha I could think of.” Then he backtracks. “You are available, right?”
“S-sure.” Jungkook can’t believe Seokjin thought of him just like that. It’s a good sign, right? It has to be. Maybe he should be ashamed of how hopeful it makes him. Not very alpha-y behaviour, some might say.
“Oh. Good.”
There’s a moment, way too long, where they both seem to reevaluate this whole mess.
“Look,” Seokjin starts. He pushes the food container Jungkook’s way again. “I get it if you don’t wanna do it–”
“Oh, I’ll do it,” Jungkook cuts in because, really, there was never another option for him. He just needed to get his head around the concept.
Seokjin’s massive shoulders visibly sag and it makes Jungkook’s inner alpha very, very happy to see a little smile tug at the corner of his lips.
Yep.
Well, in any case, Jungkook won’t have to work very hard to pretend he’s in love.
***
“It’s never gonna work,” Yoongi tells Seokjin the next day over lunch.
“Why? I thought of everything,” Seokjin replies confidently, testing Yoongi to find a flaw in his plan. “I’ll draw mating marks on with makeup. They do it all the time in movies. Why wouldn’t I be able to pull it off? I’ve actually found a YouTube tutorial.”
Yoongi doesn’t look impressed. “Drawn-on mating marks?” he drawls. “That’s your plan?”
Seokjin shrugs.
“You forget one thing.” Yoongi points at him with his spoon. “Scent. Jungkook doesn’t smell mated. He smells very much like he wants to mate.”
And, yes. That. “We’ll share some clothes or something. Blend our scents together.”
Yoongi gives him a pointed look.
“Scent is not the huge problem you think it is, okay?” Seokjin says. “I don’t mind a little platonic scenting from time to time. It’s fine.”
Yoongi just stares some more.
“Alright, okay. I’m not a huge fan of scenting.”
Still nothing from Yoongi.
“Okay, I hate it. There. You happy?” Seokjin throws his arms. “Can you blame me for not loving not smelling like myself? There’s nothing wrong with that.”
Yoongi shrugs. “I don’t mind smelling like Hobi.”
“Unfair. You’re in love with him.”
“My point exactly. Jin. You should just wait for someone you don’t mind smelling like and put an end to this whole thing before it blows up in your face.”
“It’s just for one night. I can pretend for one night. After that I’ll have them off my back for a good long while.”
Yoongi snorts. “Until the next pack gathering, you mean.”
It’s the thing, isn’t it? Seokjin twirls the content of his bowl around with his chopsticks. “I don’t plan on having to gather with this pack forever, you know?” he tells his cooling noodles.
“Oh? Is fake emancipation part of the plan too?”
Seokjin looks up at Yoongi to find him still ever-staring with both judgmental eyebrows raised high.
To comprehend how delicate the subject of emancipation is to omegas like Seokjin and Yoongi who never really felt at home in their respective packs, you’d have to understand the basics of the thing. Traditionally, omegas are expected to stay in the pack they’re born in and alphas are encouraged to go off on their own, leave their pack to either (and more commonly) agglomerate to their omega’s pack or (if they present some alpha leadership skills) form their own pack from scratch. It’s the way it is.
“It’s unfair,” Seokjin laments (not for the first time).
“We’re not gonna have this discussion again,” Yoongi warns.
“You’re the one who brought it up.” Seokjin pouts. Way too often since they’ve known each other Yoongi has had to convince Seokjin to be patient and give himself time, meticulously getting him back from the brink of defecting his familial pack. Stranded omegas are not unheard of but they’re also not that well received in society. There were screaming matches and a lot of tears involved. Nothing Seokjin particularly wants to remember. At the end of the day, not having to deal with reclusion at a young age allowed Seokjin to study abroad and put all his rebellious energy into his career. He’s a chef now (and one of the rare omegas to ever become one). He’s not complaining. “I’m not complaining,” he says.
“Good,” Yoongi says. “Now that we both agreed your plan is stupid—
“Hey.”
“—I’m guessing you didn’t have too much trouble convincing Jungkook to go along with it.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“Ah, come on, Jin. The baby alpha is whipped already.”
“Whipped for my kimchi fried rice, you mean?”
Yoongi nods passively while chewing on some peas. “Fine. Play dumb, I don’t care. It suits you, anyway.”
Seokjin winks, choosing (as always) to ignore Yoongi’s rudeness. “I love you too.”