1

Derek trudged down the hall, dragging his feet behind him. He'd just quit the basketball team, and the coach had not been happy. A lecture, that had been expected, but coach had pretty much lost his shit on Derek.

It was not fair.

Potential, shmotential.

His mom wouldn't let him keep playing basketball for much longer after high school anyways. Probably. He was starting to feel a little growly on the court.

So no coach, he was not ignoring opportunities other people would have been grateful for. Jerk butt.

He yanked open his locker, and scowled at the heart shaped candy grams that fell out of it. Leaning down to scoop them up again, and digging for his books with his other hand, he froze.

Familiar handwriting curled over the sides of one of the cards.

"Dear Derek,

I guess I'll get you one of these. Chrissy who sits next to me in homeroom is sending you one, so I will too.

xox,

Paige"

With a whimper, Derek scrubbed at his eyes, slammed his locker shut, and ran home. He barely bothered to check his speed through the streets, then leapt up the stairs of his house and to curl up under his blankets.

2

Derek kept running, running, running. Laura was in these woods somewhere as well. It was a full moon, and the Alpha in upstate New York – a college friend of their mother's - had practically tried to smother him in her bosom when she'd realized these were Talia's kids.

At least when he was like this, wild, in the woods, his best self, he didn't have to remember blonde hair shaking around a smiling face, and hands moving over his body.

Smoke rolling through the air, the kind police officer firmly taking him away. He'd just sobbed on the man for an hour, but hadn't been able to look at Laura for weeks.

He waggled his head, sniffed the fresh air, and then decided to scale one of the tall pine trees.

Once it was finally morning, he flopped down on the front lawn on the house, feeling content for a while at last. Laura silently came and flopped next to him, and Derek started to feel relaxed. It might not be so bad if they could stay here for a while.

One of the betas from the pack lay down next to them and Derek turned to her with an easy smile, trying to ignore the way her blond hair made his stomach clench.

So of course that made it way more awkward when he became terrified by her hand sneaking onto his thigh in a few months. He'd snapped at her Valentine card. He'd ripped up the card and threw it at her.

Later he would remember her crumpled, confused face and hate himself even more.

But, all that Valentine's all he could see or smell was blond hair.

3

Laura had found them a cool apartment in the city. And Derek soon found that he loved living in the city. There weren't too many neighbourhoods that hadn't been carved up into pack territory, but for the most part, they all let two orphaned wolves roam how they pleased.

Derek was finishing high school online and with a tutor, and Laura started taking a few college courses, just to have something to do. She was doing well though, and her professors were encouraging her to apply for one of the big schools.

The nightlife was intriguing too. Derek didn't really have a fake ID, but he'd been going for long runs around the city, and lifting some weights at the local gym. He stared at himself in the mirror at home, and rubbed his beard. Flexing a little, he realized his body had changed. Shoulders broadened, hairier, and a full beard at last. He looked like someone different. Someone new.

He pulled on a tight shirt and went to a club he'd heard students giggle about in the coffee shop where Laura liked to study.

Staring at the bouncer, he shifted his stance a little, but he was barely given a once over before the man nodded him inside. He heard the people behind him being stopped and carded, and his spirits, such as they were, buoyed a bit more.

Inside the bar it was dark, there were crowds and smells, it was exciting. A blond woman, wearing a tight red dress, thick eyeliner, brought him a drink, and Derek barely smiled, but then the she bought him another. Bored, Derek got up and left and found himself dancing with a dark haired man.

His lips were soft underneath his. Derek had thought a beard would scratch at him more.

It wasn't long before the man dragged him out of the club, and shoved him into a cab to take him to his apartment. Thankfully, the apartment was nearby, and whatever the man did, he was successful enough to not have roommates.

Derek lay down and felt the man's hands roam over his body. He didn't think about blond hair even once.

He wasn't sure what to do afterwards, but when they were done, the man invited him to stay. In the morning, he yawned and woke up early. Padding to the washroom, he paused. There was a room down the hall a bit he hadn't looked at the night before. Hanging there in that hall, was picture after picture of the man and pretty woman with eyes the same color as Paige's. Judging by the white dress in some of the photos, they were more than friends.

He felt himself growing hotter and hotter, and his back started to itch, right in between his shoulderblades. Derek stared down at his hands, and pinched his own torso. Definitely awake.

Walking back into the kitchen, he noticed a calendar with … two sets of handwriting on it. One was marked with a return date, surrounded in little hearts.

On today's date, the 14th, he picked up a pen and neatly wrote an "F. U."

He decided to leave his shirt on the bedroom floor and quietly let himself out of the apartment.

From then on, he still loved the excitement of the night time, and new strangers, and strange new places. But he wouldn't sleep over with anyone, and found that he never really wanted to either.

4

Derek had thought he'd be able to protect himself from grief by being harder, stronger. He pushed his body to be stronger, he wouldn't let anyone close.

Well, he'd been wrong.

To top it off, he was stuck right back where he'd started from. But all by himself. In crappy Beacon Hills. With no family but an Uncle he'd … well he'd never really trusted Peter. And then Peter had had to go and kill Laura.

He paced back and forth in the train car.

The smell of chlorine was still clinging to his skin. Derek had tried to rinse off by diving into the lake in the preserve but it sort of just didn't beat … soap. He remembered how long it took to dig a hole to bury Laura, panting and sweating out his tears. Reek from the wolfsbane had clung to his skin then too. Just focusing on the anger. It would start the progress… it just had to.

A weird clanking sound came from somewhere in the train car and a loud yelp sounded out.

"Stiles?"

The human boy staggered through the train car, and waved some papers at him. Ever since he'd failed to yank a bullet out of Derek, he'd kept trying to make …friends.

In his way.

Now that he'd held him up in a pool for hours, it seemed he'd decided to just start barging into his territory whenever he felt like it. He stank like sugar and … and other teenage boy smells.

"I know you own an entire apartment building Derek. Why in the hell do you live here?"

Derek rubbed his eyebrows.

"You looked through property records in your dad's office, didn't you Stiles?"

"Well so what if I did?" Stiles was waving his arms around. "Things are getting hard around here!"

"I think you should have better things to do today Stiles," interrupted Derek. He strolled over to his punching bag, and stripped off his shirt before he started pounding into it.

He heard an indignant noise behind him, but ignored it.

Stiles should really try asking out that red-headed girl who'd been screwed over by Uncle Peter, Derek told himself. One of his knuckles split open punching the bag, and quickly healed itself. He could smell dejection and shame behind him, and ignored it firmly.

It was for the best.

Didn't really feel like the best, though, as sad dejected smells wafted over to him. Derek had to start pulling his punches though, because he'd been lucky to find the one punching bag, he really didn't need to run around using his (traceable) credit card buying another one.

"If you ever move into that apartment, I'm throwing a Valentines' Day party in it," mumbled Stiles.

And he turned and left.

5

This was terrible.

He'd just wanted to invite a pretty girl over to his apartment, just once. Make her a nice candle light dinner. Impress her with his home baked brownies. She was even an English teacher, a nice smart teacher. Maybe he could recite her some Shelley.

And now Stiles, infuriating Stiles, was laying on his couch moping about Lydia prancing around school with some new meathead.

There was no reason for Stiles to be there in his apartment so much, but he was a good enough research/stakeout buddy, now that Derek had trained him properly. Like to not leave fast food wrappers in his new car.

Stiles rolled over so he was face down on the couch, and pressed his face into the cushions.

"Seh woaaan' everrrrr nodis meee!"

Stiles wailed. He mashed his face into the pillows. He hitched his knees up under himself and wiggled himself further into Derek's couch, which managed to cause his ass to wave around in the air. Derek stopped futzing around his kitchen and froze.

The rant of the heartbroken teen (he was just a teen) continued but Derek thought he might be hypnotized.

Maybe, maybe he just had a magic ass. There was no way Derek had tried this hard to be normal, only to be hypnotized by a teenager's ass. Maybe Stiles was actually an evil witch here to seduce him with his wiles, and his magic ass. His round, perky ass that Derek bet would feel amazing pressed against ….

Oh God.

Derek was putting a stop to this right now. It was inappropriate, at that age, Derek would know.

"You should just suck a dick." Well, that wasn't what he'd meant to say at all.

Stiles popped up out of the cushions, his mouth hanging open with indignation.

"Excuse me?!"

"I said try sucking a dick." Derek shrugged. "It sure as hell worked for me last time I had a hard time getting over a girl."

Stiles face was going from red to crimson and Derek was loving it. He removed himself from Derek's couch, mumbled an excuse and scampered out of his apartment.

Which is what made it so, so much worse, afterwards, when Derek was lurking outside the Stilinski house, waiting to quiz Stiles about a new witch in town who was there to mess with the ley lines.

Or at least that's what he thought.

He paced around a little, then getting tired of waiting he scaled the tree outside Stiles's window (and really, the Sheriff should know better than to leave that tree just growing there) thinking he would just barge in and experience the satisfaction of Stiles' startled flails.

He crept up and leaned in the window.

Scott was laying back on Stiles's bed. His face was contorted and he looked like he was panting. On the far side of the bed, Stiles popped up and rubbed at his mouth.

Oh God.

Oh God.

Those were blow job lips. That was Stiles's blow job face. Derek had told him to go try sucking a dick and he'd actually gone and done it. Stiles and Scott were such close friends that Scott probably wouldn't have thought twice before offering himself up for experimentation. Scott had probably spent forever sliding in and out of those plush lips, and grabbed at all that brown hair and … and …

…and Derek was going to go buy a whole entire day-old Valentine's Day cake, and eat the whole entire thing alone in his apartment now.

He jumped out of the tree and stormed off.

+1 – About three years later.

"You know you're the only one who ever gets this ass right?" Stiles was kneeling in between his legs and smirking at him. His other hand was slowly running along his ass, his definitely magic ass.

Derek wiggled a little against the ropes tying his hands to the headboard, then sighed happily as Stiles returned to him.

It had taken awhile for him to come around to being tied up. Being bound wasn't exactly filled with romantic, cuddly associations for him … but seeing the expression on Stiles's face after he'd bound him the first time, how hard he'd gotten and the limp happiness in his body afterwards had definitely made him think the whole thing would be worth the effort.

And it had been.

Derek let out a wail as well, incoherent at this point. "Kiss me," he managed to pant out.

Stiles obliged, leaning down as he rolled his hips and pressing a light kiss to his lips. Derek sighed happily.

"Happy Anniversary baby," mumbled Stiles.

"Happy Valentine's," gasped Derek.

And it was.