Chapter 4

" - and so you ran." Angelica Schuyler, in all her intricacies and tendencies towards complex ideological structures, managed to summarize Hamilton's plight into a pitiful phrase.

His fingers fiddled with the cloth of the blanket, dragging his blunt nails along the surface absently. It was about the right shade, Hamilton speculated, as he tried to come up with some kind of retort, but he just felt so ashamed. "I didn't run." He said, then changed tactics, backtracking because he couldn't believe how childish he sounded, but his mouth, like usual, was quicker than his brain. "You haven't met him! You don't know!"

Angelica rolled her eyes, setting her tea cup onto its little matching saucer. "Alexander," she chided, crossing her legs and leaning back into the cushions of her seat. "You were afraid of something you did not understand and youran."

Hamilton groaned, looking down at the blanket he'd confiscated from the couch, forcefully trying to keep himself from burying his face in the fabric. "I don't even know him."

"And isn't it just spectacular that you managed, against all odds, to find yourself in this predicament anyway?" Angelica counteracted, stating the obvious because she knew her friend would just keep beating around the proverbial bush until he came to the same conclusion later anyway and she just wanted to further along the conversation sooner.

"I didn't seek your confidence to be ridiculed," he murmured, unwillingly insolent. Angelica scoffed, but Hamilton continued, "but anyway-"

"It is a strange circumstance, I must admit." Angelica interrupted, leaning forwards, elbows on her knees. Hamilton could see down the front of the young woman's dress, between the mounds of flesh into a darkened valley and he wondered, as he often did, whether or not, in another life, he and Angelica might have been happy together. "The likelihood of meeting one's mate is so rare, especially with the recent end of war, everyone seems content to find happiness where they can."

"I suppose this is your way of telling me I should be happy about it."

"Well," Angelica's mouth pulled sideways, almost smiling, or perhaps grimacing, "I'm not advising you to jump from the London Bridge, if that's any consolation."

Hamilton scowled, "I'll admit the idea has merit even without your endorsement."

"Ah, the usual out. I'd thought you were against being usual, Alexander, isn't that what all of this is about? After all, wouldn't it be awfully drab to be that one out of thousands that found happiness?"

"It isn't about being unusual, Angelica, as you're fully aware."

Angelica hummed, "No. I suppose it's really not."

Hamilton huffed in frustration, trust Angelica to be willfully happy about his anguish. His hormones were screaming at him, even in the comfort of his most trusted friend's home, to leave the presence of the other omega - to go back to the office, find Jefferson and claim what washis. "What did you feel, when you met Church?"

Angelica shrugged, "The usual flare of hormones. As you know, we met at a gala. My scent was covered by my perfume, so he didn't know right away. But I did, as soon as he gathered me up to dance I knew."

Hamilton felt a flash of pain, the beginning of a headache. He paused for a moment, something that he did on occasion - he couldn't be a whirlwind of change constantly. "I see."

Angelica hummed, taking a sip of her tea, before replacing it on the saucer, "What do you see?"

"No. Nothing" He stood up with the blanket and folded it over his arm. "I should go."

"Should I have someone escort you, Alexander?"

"It's fine. I'll be fine. Thank you for your hospitality." He bowed, his brow creased as he did so. His head was pounding and he was starting to sweat. It wasn't until he'd reached home that Alexander realized he'd brought the blanket home.