Chapter 1: Stiles Anchor

It was a Wednesday night around six o'clock when Stiles was up in his room studying for his Chemistry test that was on Friday. The Sherriff just got home with some pizza after a long day of work at the station.

"Stiles, Pizza's here!" he yelled up to his son. No response.

"Stiles I know you're hungry, take it or leave it." He yelled again. Still no response, it wasn't like Stiles to turn down pizza, or any food at all. The Sherriff put the pizza in the kitchen and dragged his feet up the stairs to get his son. He approached the door and heard something strange, coming from inside his son's room. He put his ear to the door, and heard stiles talking, he assumed his son was on the phone so he started to walk away when he heard something very strange.

"Come on Stiles… its nine easy letters" Stiles whimpered.

The Sherriff thought this was a good enough excuse to come in. As he walked into Stiles room he was shocked. There were papers scattered on the floor and all kinds of books open sitting on Stiles' bed. In the middle of all the books was Stiles, holding his head staring at his chemistry textbook as if it was in some ancient language. As the Sherriff entered Stiles room, his son looked up at him with confusion and pain in his eyes. His dad rushed over to him and held his hands to stop them from shaking.

"This is the third time today… and the fifth this week… it's getting worse" Stiles trailed off. He looked up at his father, who was trying to comprehend what was happening. His dad cared and wanted to help, but just didn't know what to do to help besides comfort his son in the hopes of his nightmare to end.

"I thought it stopped when…it… got out of you… why didn't you tell m-"

"I didn't want you to worry about me… it did stop… but it started happening again the beginning of this week."

"So you can't read anything right now?" His father asked observing his panicking son.

"Well, it's not as bad as it used to be in the sense that it comes and goes. One minute I'm reading chemistry… the next I'm just reading mixed up letters and symbols." Stiles announced shaking his head. He was looking down at the textbook, he never wanted to be able to study this bad in his life. Stiles already knew the information for the test, however what he was really looking for in his book was the assurance that he would be able to interpret the letters and formulate them into words.

"I uh… I remember you used to think of something to focus on and then you could decipher whatever it was you were reading… so what did you focus on?" The Sherriff was attempting his best to help his son, he was still trying to comprehend all the strange occurrences that has been happening in Beacon Hills for the longest time. He finally was informed of what was really going on, only three months ago which was still too soon for him to understand. Being a Sherriff he is a logical thinker, and tries to investigate every scenario, but having the answers to most of his cases being something he had known his life as being impossible, was hard to wrap his head around. Most of the time he didn't want to believe the reason why things were occurring, but he had to in this case, because this was his son.

"I focused on Malia, and I don't have her anymore." Stiles was still upset about the breakup, even though he broke up with her. He really liked her but he couldn't be with someone he didn't love, he couldn't do that to her, when he was in love with Lydia. Malia was great, she would kiss him and he would enjoy it, but the world didn't stop spinning like it did with Lydia. What upset him the most was how much the breakup hurt her. She was one of his really good friends, and he crushed her. Malia ended up moving away somewhere and no one has heard from her since.

"Well you were never really that into her anyways right? What's that redhead your head over heels for again?" the Sherriff said trying to come up with her name.

"Lydia and her hair is actually strawberry blonde…but do you really think it will work?" It never came across Stiles mind to think about Lydia, which was surprising because she's all he thinks about.

"Well why did Malia work?" This was a very good question, that Stiles himself probably didn't know the answer to.

"I don't really know actually… I guess because she had that whole supernatural, wild fascination about her you know?"

"Actually I don't know, I have no idea but that seems to be a theme in this town. The closest thing I came to wild was this redhead I met in a-"

"Dad! Stop your trip down memory lane, there are bigger problems right now like my inability to read!" Stiles thought about Lydia again, maybe she would work, she was his emotional tether to bring him back.

"Well if you want supernatural fascination, you have a redhead of your own that is a GPS for soon to be dead people so if that's not supernatural I don't know what is." His father said with a laugh. Stiles was much calmer he still might not have an ability to read but his face wasn't worried.

"Ok I will try"

Stiles closed his eyes and thought about Lydia. He thought back to the dance, where he danced with her like they were the only two people in the room. He remembered the lacrosse game when he scored the goals and she looked at him, her emerald eyes gazing at him from the bleachers, they could have been miles apart but nothing could shield the look of pure gratification she gave him that night. The best moment he shared with her was the day she kissed him, the day he held his breath, the day his lust, turned to love.

He thought about all the times he had with Lydia and he slowly opened his eyes and before him clearly nine letters appeared

CHEMISTRY

It was her. Lydia was Stiles anchor, not to keep him from shifting to stay human like Scott, but to keep his mind sane and to focus on the five letter word that he really wants to be seeing, and that word, or name rather, was Lydia.