Chapter 1: Sleepless Nights

Why her? I don't understand. What does he see in her that he doesn't see in me? What does she have that I don't? Yea, I mean... I guess she is pretty, but I mean, come on! I'm not trying to be rude, but let's face it, I am smarter than her. To be honest, I'm smarter than the majority of this town's population. And I guess I am a little bit prettier than her. Maybe. I don't know...I'm not sure. But what is it about her? Maybe guys do find it attractive when girls act stupid. Only she isn't acting. Okay, I shouldn't have thought that. It's not her fault she grew up in the wilderness, alone, for eight years. I thought he liked girls who were intelligent. I thought he liked girls who had strawberry blonde hair and girls who were 5'3. I thought he liked me.

Although I say I don't understand, deep down, I do. I mean, let's face it. This is all my fault. I had him, I did. I know that for sure. I had him wrapped around my finger since the third grade when he would watch me from the sandbox with Scott. And suddenly, I just lost him. At the snap of a finger he was gone. Just like that.

When did it happen? When did he stop liking me? Was it when I was with Aiden? I know it was foolish and stupid for me to choose Aiden over him and I honestly don't even know why I chose him in the first place. I mean, I guess it was for the sex. Sex was my escape from the craziness of Beacon Hills and Aiden gave me just that. An escape. But that was it. I never got goosebumps when I was with him. I never got...what do girls call it? "Butterflies in their stomach"? Well whatever they call it, I never got that with Aiden either. But then again, I've never had that with anyone. Not even Jackson.

Now that I think about it, I'm not even sure if I've ever been in love. I guess Jackson would be considered my "first love" but I don't know if I could consider my relationship with him "love". We both used each other. When he would say, "Jump", I would ask "how high?". I did care for him though. I really did-I do. I still do care for him. And I'd still do anything for him. But I don't know if ever I truly loved him. I don't know. Maybe I'm thinking nonsense...

But then there's him. The guy who has saved my life over and over again. The guy who said he'd "go out of his freaking mind" if I ever died. The guy who was always there for me when I wasn't even there for him. Three years ago, I felt nothing for him. Hell, I didn't even care about him. But now... I don't know. There's something about his touch when our hands accidentally brush each other's. Something about the way my heart speeds up when he walks into the room. Something about that stupid smirk he gets on his face when he thinks he's right and I'm wrong even though I'm the one who is always right. I don't know...there's just,... There's something about him that wasn't there three years ago.

But it doesn't even matter now. I lost my chance. He's with someone else now. Someone who makes him happy I guess. In a way I'm happy for him. He deserves to be with someone who can reciprocate his feelings. I just wish that someone was me.

Lydia Martin sat up in bed and listened to the still silence of her bedroom. It was now 3:37 in the morning and by the looks of it, it seemed like she wouldn't be getting any sleep for the rest of the night. On nights like these, she would call her best friend Allison Argent and go over to her house to sleep there. But with Allison being on vacation, she had no one to talk to. No one to comfort her and say, "everything is going to be okay".

With Allison being gone, she was going to have to figure it out herself. Usually, when she couldn't talk to Allison, she would call Stiles Stilinski. But from what Lydia's heard from Scott McCall, Stiles is probably occupied making out with his werecoyote girlfriend at the moment.

With Allison still on vacation, Lydia began to feel like she had no one. Yes, she is a part of the pack, but even within the pack, she had no one. No one to comfort her on nights like these. Nights she couldn't sleep. Or nights she just wanted to talk to someone. Scott had Kira, Stiles had Malia and Derek... well Derek always prefers to be alone.

Leaning over towards her nightstand, Lydia turned on her lamp, picked up her phone, opened the contacts page and slowly began scrolling through all the names. Out of all one hundred and fourty-eight contacts on her phone, Lydia couldn't think of one contact she could call right now. You would think being one of the most popular girls in school Lydia would at least have a good amount of friends she could call in the middle of the night to confide in. Well your wrong. Lydia Martin may have been the most popular girl at Beacon Hills High School, but she was also the loneliest.

Lydia didn't mind being alone. To be honest she almost preferred it. This was the first time in her life she had ever truly been alone. She wasn't dating anyone at the moment and her best friend...well her best friend was on, what Lydia considers, "vacation". Two years ago Lydia had Jackson. And even after Jackson left, she had Aiden. And boyfriend after boyfriend, Lydia always had Allison.

But now all of them were gone.

Of course she wasn't alone all the time. She still had the pack. The only people she really ever hung out with were her friends in the pack.

After Allison left for vacation and the pack defeated the nogitsune, everything seemed to being going back to normal. Three months had passed and no new threats had risen in Beacon Hills. For a moment, Lydia almost forgot Beacon Hills was a hotspot for supernatural creatures. She found herself being a normal teenager again-hanging out with Kira and Malia at the mall, tutoring Stiles and even having dinner with the McCall family when her mom worked late, which seemed to be most nights as of late.

Trying to pay the bills, Ms. Martin had begun working two jobs. She was now a substitute teacher at Beacon Hills High School and a manager of some fancy night restaurant Lydia couldn't remember the name of. The divorce with Lydia's father had taken a toll on the Martin's, emotionally and financially. Before the divorce, Lydia's father was the breadwinner of the family, bringing home enough money to give his wife and two daughters a big house to live in, designer clothes and a house in the Hamptons. But that all changed after Ms. Martin decided to surprise her husband at work, only to find him half-naked in his office underneath his secretary, Jill.

When Lydia's parents told her about the divorce, she wasn't surprised. They hadn't been happy for a long time. Her father was always working late and going on "business trips"...or at least he claimed to be, leaving Ms. Martin to spend most nights alone since her daughter was always off with her friends. And even when Lydia's father was home, he could never talk to his wife without getting in an argument with her. They would argue about anything and everything. They even got in argument when Mr. Martin bought Sun laundry soap instead of the Tide brand.

Neither of them were happy with each other.

Neither of them loved each other. At least, not anymore.

So when Lydia received the news of the divorce, she couldn't help but feel relieved. It was another thing she didn't have to worry about anymore considering she already had enough things on her plate to worry about-supernatural and non-supernatural related.

Lydia glanced at her clock. It was now 3:45.

Realizing she wasn't going to be calling anyone tonight, she set her phone back down on her bedside table, turned off her lamp and tried to give falling asleep another shot.

Stiles Stilinski shot up out of bed in a panic, his heart beating fast and sweat dripping down his face. Clenching onto his chest, he tried taking deep breaths to slow his heart down which seemed like it could explode at any moment.

Slowly, room grew still and he soon began to calm down.

It had been a while since he last dreamt.

Two months.

After defeating the nogitsune, Stiles was plagued with a month of bad dreams. Every night he would wake up screaming, sweaty and short of breath. His dad would come running to his room in a panic, afraid for his son, only to realize Stiles was just having another one of his bad dreams.

Every night, Stiles had a different nightmare. He would have nightmares about being stuck in Eichen House. He would have nightmares about being taken over by the nogitsune again. He would even have nightmares about killing someone in the pack-Scott, Malia, Isaac, Lydia. All of them.

But this dream. This dream was different.

Familiar, but different.

"Stiles?"

Stiles turned his head to look at the girl lying next to him.

"Are you okay?" she asked, sitting up and putting her hand on his arm, "You're really sweaty. Did you have a bad dream?"

Stiles began to open his mouth to tell her, but quickly changed his mind. He wasn't sure if he should tell Malia about his dream. It's not that the dream he had was bad. He had had dreams like this before, but that was before he met Malia, After he met Malia, the dreams he had, the one like tonight, had stopped.

But now they were back. And for right now, Stiles wasn't sure if he wanted to tell her.

He also was sure if his girlfriend would want to hear it.

"Yea," he began, bringing his hand to his face and wiping the sweat off his forehead, "It was just a bad dream..."

Malia's face scrunched up. "Should I be worried?" she asked, "Do you want me to get your dad?"

Stiles shook his head, "No, no. It's fine. It's nothing. Just a random, bad dream. No big deal."

Malia wasn't sure if Stiles was being honest or if his dream was more than just a "random, bad dream", but she decided not to question him. She trusted Stiles. And she believed that if Stiles had something to tell her, he would. He always told her everything.

Sighing, Malia leaned up and kissed him on the cheek.

"Well let's just go back to bed then," she whispered, "you need to get sleep before our big history test tomorrow."

Stiles turned towards Malia with a smirk on his face.

"If anyone needs sleep for the test tomorrow, that would be you," he laughed.

Malia raised an eyebrow, "Ha. Ha," she said sarcastically, "Very funny."

Afraid she was actually offended, Stiles cupped her cheek in his left hand, leaned in and softly brushed his lips against hers.

"You know I'm kidding, right?" he asked.

Malia kissed him again and smiled, "I know. But seriously. Let's go to bed."

Stiles chuckled to himself and fell underneath the covers with Malia, grabbing her in his arms. Malia stiffened at his unusual action. Usually, Stiles was the one in her arms.

"For once," Stiles whispered, "Let me be the big spoon."

Malia smiled and kissed his chest, "Fine. But only for tonight!"

Stiles could already feel his eyes grow heavy and was about to drift off to sleep before saying, "Whatever you want my werecoyote."

The next morning, Stiles woke up feeling great. He still remembered his dream from the night before and began to grow worrisome the more he thought about it.

As Malia took a shower, Stiles sent a text to his best friend Scott.

Dude, we need to talk later. I had the craziest dream last night.

Scott texted him back shortly after.

Yea sure. We'll talk before first period.

Scott has been Stiles' best friend since the day they met on the playground at the age of four. Since then, Scott has gone through everything with Stiles. Good and bad. From the death of Stiles' mother to the day they defeated the nogitsune. Scott was always there for Stiles.

Scott was his best friend.

Scott was his brother.

Scott was one of the few things Stiles had always been thankful for. He knew he was lucky to have someone he could go to for anything. He knew he was lucky to have someone he could trust. He knew he was lucky to have someone who truly loved him. Someone who would die for him. Someone who made him happy.

Sometimes Stiles wondered what his life would be like if he hadn't met Scott that one day on the playground. At first he thought it would be easier. Normal. He wouldn't have to worry about someone trying to kill him and his friends. He wouldn't have to worry about people getting murdered by mysterious creatures. Instead, he'd worry about normal things like passing anatomy (which he was failing). And he'd probably still be worrying if he was going to ever lose his virginity.

But normal is boring.

Although dealing with the supernatural everyday had taken a toll on Stiles, he doesn't regret any part of it. He was grateful for the past three years of his life. He had a good group of friends, a hot girlfriend and a close relationship with his dad. What more could you ask for?

I'm a lucky bastard, he thought.

After Malia spent what seemed like an eternity in the shower and was finally ready for school, the couple headed downstairs and to the kitchen. Quickly, Stiles grabbed a banana from a bowl of fruit on the kitchen table and took a glance at his watch.

7:45.

"If we don't hurry now", he began, "We're gonna be late for school."

Grabbing Malia's wrist, he dragged her through the kitchen and out the front door, rushing to his jeep. Quickly, he ran over to the other side of the jeep and opened the door, waiting for Malia to hop into the passenger seat.

"What a gentlemen." Malia said with a smile.

After Malia got in the car, Stiles shut the door behind her and rushed over to the drivers side, throwing his backpack in the backseat and closing the door behind him. After sticking his keys in the ignition and turning his car on, Stiles began to back out of the drive way.

The car stopped with a jolt.

"Shit!" exclaimed Stiles.

A car was blocking the driveway.

A familiar car.

Lydia Martin's car.