Title: Antithesis
Fandom: Teen Wolf
Character(s)/Pairing: Lydia & Scott
Rating: PG
Warnings: n/a
Notes: Fill for Teen Wolf Kink Meme
Scott pulls his hand free of a lock of Lydia's incarnadine hair and wonders how different things would be if he'd never been bitten. He would've never kissed Lydia. He would've never been so cruel to Stiles. He might not've even fallen for Allison. The lock of hair falls to Lydia's chest and Lydia steps away, arms crossed.
"Sorry." Lydia's voice is pretty, even with an elegiac tremor.
Scott leans on the edge of Finstock's desk and says, "Well, I think we're both, uh, confused I guess? And I'm hurting pretty badly about Allison, so…"
"So that's an excuse to be an asshole?" She sneers at Scott from across the room. "Doesn't it seem stupid? We say we're so in love, so eternally in love - but we're only kids." Her sneer widens as she says, "What, are we going to be with these people for the rest of our lives? Decay together until we die and weep openly at the everlasting beauty of our hormonal, teenage love?" Her sneer drops. "How tragically dumb."
Scott clears his throat and looks at the floor, away from Lydia. "You're right, I guess. I mean, that's logic, right?" He focuses on the scuffed toes of his shoes and thinks of his mom. Of his dad. "That's what you're thinking, anyways." He hesitantly looks up at Lydia. "But it's not what you're feeling, is it? It's not what I'm feeling."
Lydia purses her lips and blinks her eyes. "No. But at least I'm trying." She looks quietly down at the floor, and then back up at Scott. Her eyes drop to his chest and focus there as she says, "That putative boundary that's supposed to exist between our minds and our hearts? It doesn't really exist." She looks back up at Scott. "But at least I'm trying."
Scott looks away, out at the people passing in the hallway. "You wanna know something fucked up?" Lydia raises her eyebrows and Scott says, "I came in here to talk to you about Stiles. He's like… in love with you. Has been for a really, really long time." Scott uncrosses his arms, feeling ashamed, then recrosses them and says, "But, instead of asking you if you even know he's alive, I stuck my tongue down your throat. I'm a really great friend, right?"
"No, actually, you're an asshole." Scott looks at Lydia with a frown. "But you did it because you're heartbroken over Allison, huh?" She laughs under her breath and says, "Now that's true love. Hurting people that love you because you're in love, or whatever you want to call it." She shrugs and steps closer. "If you ask me that's not love, that's love's antithesis."
"Antithesis?
"The direct opposite."
"And love's antithesis is…?"
"Stubborn, childish obsession." Scott glowers at Lydia, who's smirking at her own trenchant wit.
"Okay." He uncrosses his arms and pushes up from the desk, closer to Lydia. "Then what the hell do you call the thing between you and Jackson?"
Lydia only shrugs, still smirking.
"If you really love him, or even if what you have is better than what I have, then why did you kiss me?"
Lydia's smirk quavers and her eyes lose focus. "Because, "she says, "I…" She searches for words, eyes focused on Scott's chest. Then she closes her eyes and says, "Because I like you. And also because I'm a spiteful bitch."
Scott snorts and Lydia almost smiles, but then they're quiet. Scott had always thought Lydia was beautiful. Stunning, even. He'd always ignored his thoughts of Lydia for the sake of Stiles, but now the taste of Lydia's lip gloss is lingering in his mouth, and the guilt he feels is due in part to how he doesn't want to forget the sweet flavor.
Scott shuffles from foot to foot and asks, "Do you not like Jackson?"
"Of course I do… most of the time." She glances up at Scott, pretty eyes uncertain. "Sometimes."
"Then… why…?"
"Because sometimes what we want the most isn't what's best for us." Her eyes flicker toward the people passing by outside the office; she grabs her purse, heels clicking loudly as she struts toward the door, and pauses as she grasps the handle. "I do like Stiles, though. He's sweet. And he's cute. But…" She looks back at Scott, and they look at one another for a moment, the right words trying to break the surface, but all Lydia says is, "Good luck with Allison, though I don't think you have much of a chance anymore. If you can't win over the daddy, you don't get the daughter."
She opens the door and leaves, her incarnadine hair whipping behind her like some pale red herring blanketing everything she doesn't want to embody. Scott clenches his jaw and rubs his fingers into his eyes, and after a moment, he grabs his Crosse and heads to the field.