The ABO Serum

(Part 12) Crybaby

Bob Stacy cried at the young boys' wedding. He didn't expect to. In fact, he still wasn't sure how he felt about all this. But he never relied on his feelings to make decisions. He wasn't a man 'in touch' with his feelings like that guy Gary.

He hadn't known Gary would be at the wedding, but he supposed he knew Braedon from quarantine. The boy stopped to hug Gary on his way back out to the reception so they must be close. The pastor also shook Gary's hand on his way by. Bob couldn't imagine an old coot like himself going through the whole ABO transition, but that guy had done it, and it looked like he made it through okay.

He'd met Gary in omega quarantine, too. Well, not in quarantine but when he went to visit the pastor during the pastor's quarantine. Well, not visit precisely. He'd gone to express his disappointment that the boy who couldn't keep it in his pants was now a man who couldn't keep his wife at home, and who should leave the ministry to those morally equipped to set a better example.

That old codger met with him instead and explained, in the face of Bob's angry rant about bad examples, that his pastor couldn't listen to his verbal diarrhea because he was locked away fasting and praying trying to hear from God, so it looked like his pastor knew how to set an example after all.

Chastened, Bob went home and followed his pastor's example. It affected the drastic change in his behavior since. He'd gone from being sure of everything he believed, but not genuinely loving anyone, to questioning everything, but feeling real love again for the first time since his wife passed away. He hadn't realized that his heart shut down back then. His heart shut down and as a result his brain calcified, unable to process new information, change with the world around him, or build new relationships.

He let it because it meant he didn't feel much. He especially didn't have to feel the deep loneliness he'd started experiencing since the day he first met Gary and God used that weird old guy to get his attention and start softening his heart again.

Now, his emotions were always close to the surface. And he didn't understand them. He was raised being told that men didn't show emotion, so he barely had names for the things he kept feeling. Here he was crying at a gay wedding of all things. This was ridiculous. His wife wouldn't have known what to make of it. Truth be told, he didn't know what to make of it.

Gary never darkened the door of a church except for weddings, and he preferred alternative venues for those, but Pastor Rosenfeld nee Hartley was the one minister on planet earth he approved of, so he didn't feel too out of place at Braedon and Trevor's ceremony. It was a shame he couldn't say the same for certain members of the pastor's flock.

He remembered Bob Stacy and loathed him. He'd been so angry when he smelled an enticing fated alpha kind of fragrance in quarantine and discovered it was this prick, that he tore into him without restraint. Thank goodness Bob hadn't transitioned to an actual alpha so his scent wasn't able to send Gary spiraling with need.

Happy as he was for the boys getting married, Gary hoped for himself that fate would keep her hands off and let both men go their separate ways in peace. Alas, it was not to be. Bob Stacy sought him out at the reception, eyes moist, to apologize for his behavior when they first met.

"This has all been rather a lot for me to adapt to, but I know that I was wrong, and I appreciate you setting me straight back then. I think meeting you was the catalyst for God to get ahold of my heart again," Bob told him.

It was not a compliment to Gary to hear he'd been God's catalyst. How was he supposed to respond to that? And it didn't help that the man smelled delicious in a way that made Gary's omega body respond inappropriately. He hummed non-committedly and looked longingly at the buffet, but Bob wasn't finished.

"I've been a bit of a mess since then. I think I didn't want to feel anything after my wife passed. Feels like everything I put off is hitting me all at once now. When I think of these young ones growing together like we did, becoming one, then half of that one is gone one day, and the other half has to keep livin'. Marriage is a beautiful commitment to the deepest pain a man can feel. You don't think about it on your wedding day, but if you keep your vows it's inevitable." Bob ran out of steam and turned contemplative after this speech. Gary was a little stunned.

"That...that's a rather poetic way of saying it." He couldn't believe he was complimenting Bob. "You commit to the pain and gamble that the love and joy that come first will make it worthwhile. My marriage was definitely worthwhile, but when I think of trying again...there's maybe not enough life left in me to make that gamble pay off."

"I think so too," Bob agreed. "These fellas are smart getting married young. They've got a lot of life ahead to enjoy before the grief comes. At least, their odds are good. Our odds would be pretty slim."

He didn't specifically mean their odds of happiness if they got together with each other, Gary reminded himself. He was speaking of their odds separately, with other indeterminate partners. But the scent was so annoyingly persistent...he felt like a middle schooler with an inexplicable crush. No good reason for it, but there it was, causing embarrassing boners in inappropriate situations.

"I need to sit. Excuse me," Gary said, moving quickly to a nearby chair at a table with a long cloth draped over it that would cover his situation. Bob followed.

"You haven't got any food yet. Are you feeling unwell? Shall I bring you a plate?" Bob asked.

Desperate to send him away, Gary agreed. But it was short sighted of him because Bob came back from the buffet with two plates and sat next to him for the rest of the reception. They ended up talking about their lives and work. Bob had been an insurance salesman but was retired now. His wife died of cancer five years ago and they had no children because she'd had multiple massive ovarian cysts in her early adult years that resulted in the surgical removal of her ovaries. He was completely alone, just like Gary.

He was surprised that Gary was still working, but Gary was the librarian at GenLife since its founding and not only acquired and organized important texts for the lab, but also set up and organized their digital information systems and in the process became an important resource himself, full of institutional knowledge they were loath to let go. He had an assistant now who would eventually take over, but they offered to keep him part time for as long as he felt able to work. Since it wasn't a physically demanding job, that would probably be a long time.

He liked his work and when they waved the young couple off on their honeymoon, he confided in Bob what he'd done to set up their room because he had access. Bob laughed and thought this old guy had a sweet side as well as a mischievous one. His wife was like that and he missed it. His own natural temperament was too serious. He didn't know how to have fun on his own.

"Can we meet up again sometime?" Bob asked. Not rude enough to say no outright, Gary ended up exchanging phone numbers with Bob so they could arrange to meet again, but he didn't plan to actually do it. He should have known better.