Jaejoong doesn’t make it to class on Monday. 

Sunday night when he had gotten in, he had had every intention of doing so. Just one day- if it was a disaster, if anyone so much as looked at him sideways he would just leave. Either right to the dean’s office or the guidance counselor and he would withdraw right then and there.  

He’d even thought about texting Yunho to ask for Jihye’s number. She was a (small) big scary alpha, she could hang out with him during their joint classes, right? 

He’d halfway through writing out the text when he realizes that probably would seem weird and be generally imposing, wouldn’t it? Or is it not? Is that really what he was now? Some pathetic thing that needed an alpha to guard him? 

He and Yunho aren’t dating- he's pretty sure... They only spent his heat together...  Yunho only took his ity... although that, he knows, isn’t really the big thing parents try to make it out to be. Not when half of the people around him seem willing to anything with a pair of legs once they get a bit of alcohol in them. 

But, his mind argues, but they are supposed to go to dinner together to meet Yunho’s parents. That doesn’t seem like a casual thing. 

However, meeting the parents usually comes after dating for a while- or a couple dates at least. Maybe Yunho and his family have another plan? 

Like maybe he’s supposed to sign an NDA about how he slept with Yunho, and a contract that promises he’ll leave the Jungs alone forever or they’ll have him arrested and sue him for like a hundred million dollars or something.  

Which makes more sense than someone like Yunho wanting to present someone like Jaejoong to his family for any reason. 

The Jung’s are filthy rich, it's not like Yunho is some gorgeous but broke guy who could benefit from leeching off of Jaejoong’s bank account, which is the only feasibly positive he could bring to a relationship. Funny, how he kind of wishes it was exactly that. 

Because sure, nobody should aspire to be used by someone, but it is the only chance he would ever have to keep the alpha. 

All of his plans of showing up on campus wither just like that. 

He spends the night and the whole of Monday curled up in the corner of his sofa staring at the black screen of the TV, feeling cold despite the blanket wrapped around him. 

----- 

It’s early Tuesday when he finally moves again, he’s genuinely not sure if he’s moved in the past twenty four hours, but he doesn’t think he has if the way his legs buckle and send him stumbling to the floor has anything to say about it.  

The pin pricks of his legs being asleep with lack of use seems to crawl all the way up his spine and for a moment he’s generally afraid to get back up, but he does it anyway. 

He’s supposed to be determined and functioning and less pathetic than before. Moping on his sofa? Sure, that’s a setback, but he has yet to go digging through his medicine cabinet despite thinking about it over two dozen times, so he’s going to allow it. 

When he finally stumbles in front of the mirror in the bathroom, he’s actually surprised he doesn’t look as awful as he happens to feel. 

“So what,” the blonde murmurs at reflection, “So you’re an omega. They hate you anyway, but it doesn’t matter anymore... You’re out of that house, you’re away from them.” 

The thing staring back at him doesn’t look particularly convinced, skeptical, suspicious. He grips the edge of the sink, squeezing the porcelain until his knuckles turn just as white as it. 

“So, maybe the alpha you’ve accidentally had a crush on turns out to be better than you thought he was,” he continues, at his lips, “He’s out of your league, but you knew that already. He’s going to tell you to stay away now, probably after he waves a job in your face and demands you spill your family’s secrets, or it was probably just a lie, all of it. Notch in the bed post and all. You don’t have to be loyal to them, to any of them. You don’t have anyone but yourself, you know this.” 

He shivers, just a little bit, cocking his head to the side slightly to stare at the dark marks on his throat. 

They’re starting to fade, but that’s fine. Perhaps by the time they’re gone his thoughts will go with them. 

So what, he got to play pretend for a week, get to experience what it could have been like to have a person, to matter to someone... 

But it was just a week, he’d been alone... much, much longer than that. 

A week isn’t long enough to break him, he wants to say... 

But a week is about as long as he’s been trying to do the while... survival thing.  

And a week isn’t very long, not long enough to break a habit. 

“They’ll be happy if you die,” his voice breaks something terrible in the middle, it’s the weight, the realization of the truth of that words that slam into him, that leaves his chest feeling like it is caving inwards and being crushed, “They don’t... they don’t deserve to be happy.” 

And that, that is probably the worst sort of motivation to keep going that there could be, but it is something. Something more than he had before and he needs something, anything to hold onto.  

-----

On Thursday morning after an only slightly restless night of sleep Jaejoong catches a ride of campus with Junsu. 

On the way he informs his friend that he’ll be withdrawing, and before the beta can even think about protesting, he rushes through the reasons why. 

He doesn’t actually know if Junsu would have told him off for real or not, but there isn’t a word of anything except for those of support. 

During his brief trip around campus there are a lot of eyes on him and he is extremely glad that Junsu winds up shadowing him. At least three different alphas, two males and one female, attempt to get their hands on him. Something about mates or soulmates although one in particular had said little more than ‘I knew it’ before inviting him to a motel. 

It’s kind of mortifying, but Junsu, if he somehow hadn’t understood before, seems to get it now. 

Not every day the person people think is a beta one day, an alpha next and an omega by the week’s end finally ‘presents.’  

He’ll be allowed back, if he chooses to return, but probably not with any sort of scholarship due to his lack of dedication, they tell him. It doesn’t matter than he explains he is in a difficult medical situation. The staff is sympathetic, but rules are rules. Jaejoong doesn’t protest. 

Mostly because it won’t do him any good, mostly because he isn’t sure he’ll even go back there.  

Junsu skips class that day and they marathon The Great British Bake Off on netflix. 

He tries not to let it bother him that it’s Thursday and he hasn’t heard from Yunho. 

Instead, he sends the first message and asks how the man is doing. 

He receives an answer about an hour later. There is a photo attached, a stack of files scattered on top of a desk, contracts and reports by the looks of them. Yunho complains that he’s on day four of little to no sleep and might be dying. 

Which makes two weeks in a row of that, doesn’t it?  So, he sends an apology, strangely choked by guilt and then ignores his phone for the rest of the day. 

-----

He’s frustrated, maybe even angry. 

The office is where he thrives. It’s where he can engage his mind in a battle of wits and legal loopholes and watch over the family businesses.  

When he stays on top of everything he can usually figure out what moves the opposition are planning to make two steps ahead of them, like a satisfying game of chess and he very, very rarely loses. 

Vacations aren’t much a thing; he takes time off for his family when his mother requests him for dinner and pretty much no other time. 

People, if he feels inclined, can fit into his lunch hour, or some other hour slot, and if they need or expect more from him than that? ‘em. 

Business is his element, where he feels confident and collected and calm. It’s where he feels in control. 

So nobody had been more surprised than Yunho himself when he had taken time away from the office to see an omega through their heat. Not that he’d na