I am SO invested in this ship now I would die for Corey and also for Mason

Hope you enjoy this next installment!

"Hey."

Corey looks up. There's an ink smudge on his cheek, and a slightly manic look in his eyes. He looks frazzled, to put it mildly, and the hand holding his pen is starting to go white around his knuckles because he's gripping it so tightly. "Hey." His voice is deceptively calm, but Mason knows Corey well enough that he can hear the tension in his voice, the strain behind the tone. He also knows that Corey has a deep-rooted dread of asking for help, and won't unless he absolutely has to – and even then he won't sometimes.

Mason smiles at his boyfriend and sees Corey automatically relax a little. "You need any help with that?" he offers so Corey doesn't have to ask, tapping his own pen against the textbook in front of him. He finished a little while ago, but a little extra reading never hurt anyone. Plus, if Corey thinks he takes a little longer than he actually does to get his own work done…well, it's not going to do him any harm. He doesn't think Corey is stupid, by any stretch of the imagination, but he knows that he struggles, and is easily disheartened by academics. Mason thinks there's something in Corey's psyche that associates not immediately understanding something with absolute failure, and then his brain just shuts down because he has zero faith in himself.

Corey shrugs. "Yeah. Thanks." Mason recognises the fake-casual tone, knows that if they continue to do the work right now it will just result in one of Corey's own special brand of meltdowns (the kind where he resolutely refuses to accept that he's having a meltdown despite being in floods of tears, and then refuses to accept any comfort because when he's panicked he reverts back to thinking he's not worth anything, despite normally being very affectionate with his boyfriend…and pretty much everyone in the pack) so Mason scoots closer and yanks the textbook from his hands, closing it and tossing it to the other side of the table.

"Dude," Corey says, hands still out as if he's holding the book, frowning at them like he doesn't quite understand what just happened. "That's…that's not how you do homework." He looks up at Mason, confused, big brown eyes wide.

"Humour me," Mason says, and plucks the almost-crushed pen from his grip. Corey looks comically startled at the movement. "I, uh, wanted to ask you something, actually. Something kind of serious."

Corey bites his lip, and tries to dispel his anxiety with a joke. "Are you proposing?"

Mason grins at him, realising the words for what they are. "You wish," he replies lightly, and kind of hopes that Corey does wish that. At least a little bit. "No, I, uh, wanted to ask you about, um…" He makes a vague gesture in front of him. Corey just shakes his head, bemused. He knows that Corey hates talking about how he became a chimera, at least in terms of the Dread Doctors, and he's not sure how he'll react to a question about before that, how he came to be a genetic chimera. "You know…"

"I don't know," Corey says when Mason tails off, looking so earnest and serious and cute that Mason can't decide whether he wants to fuck him or cuddle him. Probably both, Mason will always happily do both.

"Just wondering about how you came to be a chimera," Mason says, as casually as he can. He regrets saying it so bluntly when he sees Corey's face fall and close off, and hurries to clarify, "I mean, you need another person's DNA, right, like an organ or tissue transplant?"

"Oh, yeah." The frown that had appeared vanishes and he smiles instead, obviously relieved he doesn't have to talk about being experimented on and whatever the hell else those bastards did to him. "I got cancer when I was like, seven? In my liver. I don't really remember it, but I remember that it was caught quickly, and it hadn't spread. Apparently, that's, like, super rare, to catch it so soon, but whatever. The doctors said that I would need a liver transplant at some point, or a partial liver transplant, or something, and they gave me chemotherapy and stuff, and then two years after my diagnosis, a guy was killed in a car crash and we were compatible. So, yeah, new liver for Corey."

"It wasn't a family member's, then? Just some dude who got hit by a car?" Mason wonders if any of Corey's family would have been willing to give him part of their liver.

"Yep, some random guy's liver, right here." Corey pats his stomach, then pauses to look up at Mason. "Is that where the liver is?"

Mason moves his hand to the correct position, grinning. "You were close. This is where some random guy's organ is inside you."

Before he can wince at what he just unthinkingly said, Corey laughs and says, "Wouldn't be the first time!" and his giggles are so infectious that Mason ends up laughing too.

When he gets a hold of himself, he continues, "For real though, I didn't know you had cancer."

Corey shrugs. "Like I said, I don't really remember. I remember never feeling hungry and throwing up loads, but it wasn't that bad. Worse stuff going on." He clicks his pen slightly aggressively.

Mason guesses he's referring to his parents, and doesn't know whether to push the issue or not. He knows that Corey's parents are pieces of shit and that's why Corey is perfectly happy with his parents living in another home in a different state, but he doesn't know any more than that, never wanted to ask because of the pain that crosses Corey's eyes whenever the subject is brought up. Now, though, Corey seems a bit more open about it. "You mean like your mom and dad?"

Corey clicks the pen again, and again, and then it sticks and breaks from the force he's been using. "Oops," he says, deadpan, and tosses the pen aside. Mason thinks he's going to dodge the question, but then he picks up another pen and begins fiddling with it, albeit a little less aggressively as he talks again. "Could we move to the couch?"

"Uh – yeah, sure." Mason stands first, chair scraping against the wooden floor, and they both wince at the sound. Corey pushes his back silently, dropping the pen on the table with a clatter, and they both head into the adjacent sitting room where Corey collapses on the end of the longest sofa, looking expectantly at Corey. Mason grins at him and falls, equally gracefully, onto the other end, and then carefully stretches out so Corey can lie on top of him. Once they're both settled Mason wraps his arms around Corey, holding him snug to him, and plants a kiss on his non-inked cheek. "You don't have to talk about this if you can't."

Corey lifts his head from where he's plonked it on Mason's shoulder, and smiles tiredly. "I can, and I should. Might just take me a while." He sighs heavily, then looks directly into Mason's eyes. "I want you to know everything about me," he whispers, "because I trust you."

Mason tightens his grip around him, wanting to do something else but not willing to break the eye contact. Corey breaks it by leaning in and kissing him, slow and sweet, then drops his head back down and nuzzles into Mason's neck, inhaling deeply.

"Can you hear me?" he asks. "I want to talk about it, but it might be easier here." Mason smiles and rubs his nose into Corey's hair. It's kind of a thing they have.

"Yeah, I can hear you."

"Well…" Corey inhales and exhales deeply. "They didn't want me. They were really young, like my mom was eighteen, and my dad was nineteen, when they had me, and it was loads of stress for them. They started drinking and taking drugs and stuff to cope. It was okay, though, because both of my grandparents were still alive then, and they basically were my parents for the first year of my life. Then my grandad died, so I went back to them, and…" He pauses, takes in a shuddering breath. "Sorry. Can't really even remember it that well."

"Take your time." Mason slides his hands up and down Corey's spine, slight pressure just how he likes. Predictably, Corey arches into the weight just a little, and Mason swears he purrs a little. "If you need to stop…"

"No, I'm good," Corey breathes. "Um…yeah. I don't have any memories particularly until I was about four, I think? So I don't know how bad it was. Or how good. I think it was more bad, though? But, yeah, when I was four. I wasn't so good at understanding to keep my mouth shut back then so I got hit a load of times. Mom used to lock me in this pantry thing we had, but there was no food in there or anything, just dust and spiders and dirt. Sometimes for a few hours, sometimes overnight. She never hit me, that was always Dad. I don't know which was worse, really. They always said it was because I was making too much noise, so it was my fault."

"Corey, you don't still think that, right? That it was your fault?" Mason feels Corey tense and shove his face further into the junction between his neck and shoulder. "Corey, it wasn't your fault."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Corey mumbles, but a beat too late. "I mean – I do know, technically, but sometimes my logic and emotions don't always agree, you know?"

"I get it. As long as you do really know that, though."

"I'm getting there." He shuffles down a little, so he can rest his head on Mason's chest instead. "Maybe one day I'll get there totally."

"You will." Mason hums and moves his hand to Corey's neck instead, squeezing lightly. "I'll help you get there."

Corey smiles at him, and then closes his eyes for a few seconds, steeling himself for the memories. "Yeah, so, that was life. I kind of got used to it, learnt how to hide it from teachers and stuff. I didn't really get any better at figuring out when to shut up, though. I think I just kind of kept hoping that they'd improve, you know? And sometimes the drugs made them really happy and they'd talk to me normally, and I thought they loved me so I'd try and talk to them the next day and then they'd get angry I was talking to them and—"

"Corey, breathe. Seriously, take a breath."

Corey takes several, and then finds Mason's hand and tangles it in his own. "I love you so much," he says, out of nowhere. Mason blinks and is about to return the sentiment when Corey plunges back in

"Then a teacher at school took me to hospital because I kept throwing up, or something, and my parents were really pissed off that they had to come in and it turned out I had cancer."

"Were they less pissed off when they found that out?" Mason asks, already feeling like he knows the answer.

Corey snorts. "We don't have good health insurance, and we didn't back then either. They were even angrier because of the cost of all the treatments and stuff."

"Yeah, how dare you get cancer?" Mason teases, trying to ease the tension in the room that seems to be suffocating Corey slightly. Thankfully, Corey grins at that, rather than getting more upset, and even giggles a little, muffling the noise in Mason's chest.

"Just a horrible child," Corey says, a little too cheerfully for Mason's liking, but then he carries on, "While I was in the hospital, the nurse – ha, it was Melissa, actually – noticed that they weren't really very caring parents, so she got the police involved and stuff – the Sheriff, actually. And they got their custody of me removed, and my grandma took me in instead. Oh, and my doctor was Liam's stepdad. Weird, right?"

"Small world," Mason muses, a lot of things suddenly falling into place – like how Melissa always gives Corey an extra tight hug when she sees him, and how Liam's dad always asks how Corey is getting on…and that time when they had a pack meeting at Stiles' house, and it was getting late, and Stiles was doing his usual teasing thing to the younger pack members, and asked Corey if he needed to ring his parents to ask for an extension on his curfew, and before Corey could formulate any kind of answer to that the Sheriff suddenly appeared and told Stiles that if anyone needed to be worrying about curfews, it was Stiles himself considering he'd missed so many. "When did you officially become cancer free?"

"Nine. That's when I had the transplant. I moved in with my gran properly then – I'd been in and out of the hospital too much to properly settle in."

"How long did you live with her?"

"Until I was eleven. Then she…died." Corey swallows. "I wasn't old enough to look after myself, obviously, so they gave custody back to my parents. They got off the drugs, and the alcohol – enough to fool social services, at least, I think they still used them quite a lot – they went on all these courses about parenting so they were deemed responsible."

"That's…" Mason shakes his head. "That's such bullshit."

Corey shrugs. "I guess. But it wasn't so bad. I can take care of myself now, and I could then – making food, going to school, that kind of stuff, so they didn't have to be at home so much. And I know how to avoid setting them off now whenever they are actually home."

Mason bites his lip. "Corey, the way you say that kind of stuff…it really sounds like you're still blaming yourself. I know it doesn't come easy, but you have to know it's not your fault, at all. I mean, I am really glad that your parents aren't around much, but it shouldn't be that you're happy they aren't around much.."

"I know. I know, I do know. I guess I'm just kind of used to saying it like that because nobody's ever corrected me before. You're the first person who's ever noticed me."

Mason isn't convinced that Corey really doesn't believe it's his fault, but he can also see that Corey is reaching the point of emotional exhaustion, so he doesn't push the issue anymore. Instead, he lifts his boyfriend's chin and says softly, "Thanks for telling me."

Corey smiles, a ghost of his usual grin, and mutters, "Should be thanking you for letting me get that off my chest. It was..."

"Cathartic?" Mason guesses.

Corey narrows his eyes at him. "Perhaps. Give me a definition and then I'll tell you."

.

"Um, cathartic, like... cleansing. Purifying. If something causes you catharsis, it causes you release of emotional tension that refreshes your spirit."

"Yeah, that's what it was. Thanks, walking dictionary."

Mason pretends to be offended at that, and leans forward to kiss him. Corey responds enthusiastically, and then nearly falls off the sofa when Mason pulls back. He grins goofily at him, righting himself, and for a second Mason marvels at how Corey can smile so brightly that he lights up the universe when he's suffered enough for ten lifetimes over.

The thought disappears when Corey starts to push himself up, glancing over to the dining room where the homework lies, abandoned. "Hey, hey!" Mason protests. "No more Physics tonight, okay?"

Corey squints at him. "I thought you liked Physics."

"I do. I love Physics, actually, but you don't, and you're getting stressed." Mason grabs Corey's waist to stop him from moving, and then sits up himself – as best he can with someone on his lap, at least. He tugs Corey a little closer to him, so their chests are touching.

"I'm not getting that stressed," he says, but there's no heat behind the words whatsoever, and his eyes are practically glowing with affection. Mason knows the argument is just for the sake of appearances, and so tomorrow when Corey doesn't want to do his Physics homework but has to he can blame it on Mason for distracting him.

Mason just gives him a look, like he always does, and Corey grins, acquiesces by ducking his head and shrugging. "Okay, no more homework tonight." He gets a wicked grin then, and adds, "Why would I want to do homework when I could do you?"

Mason groans and Corey starts cackling, clearly incredibly proud of himself. Mason ends up laughing too, because when Corey starts laughing he really can't help himself, and they only stop when Corey accidentally puts his hand on the remote and a rerun of an old crime show suddenly starts blaring at them. Corey jumps so hard he actually does fall off the sofa, which reduces them back to more helpless giggles.

Mason eventually gets enough of a grip to sit up, grab the remote and turn the TV off, and the only sound that fills the room is the chimera's slightly hyperactive giggles. "Want to come join me?" Mason asks, and a second later Corey's head pops up and he smiles far too innocently.

"Depends what's in it for me," he says nonchalantly, climbing onto the sofa and crawling onto Mason's lap, very deliberately grinding his hips down and creeping his hands under Mason's shirt.

Mason swallows and then clears his throat. "Want to go up to your room?"

"Hell yeah."

Shout out to my irl friend Alice for looking over this for me, idk if you'll bother to read this online but if you are I LOVE YOU!

Comments make me cry tears of happiness, etc