Derek POV
He heard the sounds when he went to get a glass of water and a snack. It wasn't the first time in the last few weeks that he'd woken up hungry in the middle of the night, so he just made sure to be extra quiet while he made a midnight snack. It also wasn't the first time he'd heard restless noises from Chloe's room, only this time, they ended with a shout of fright.
"It's just a nightmare," he muttered to himself. But he was already half-way up the stairs.
Chloe opened the door before he could knock, staring up at him with wide, glassy eyes. The sleepy, confused expression shifted instantly to what could be considered a scowl. "What were you doing?"
"I was downstairs," he grunted, "I heard you having a nightmare. I was just going to ask if you're okay."
She hesitated, then said, "I think I...I mean, I know I raised something outside on accident. Or more than one something." She looked over her shoulder and eased the door closer to her, so he couldn't see into the room. "I'm just going to go outside and...or maybe just go to the window."
"It's easier when you're closer, so we should go outside."
"Yeah, but they're right there, and..." she trailed off, catching his pronoun. "We?"
"Yeah. We."
Derek braced for her to argue; she'd see it as him being unreasonably protective; he'd tell her that he'd do the same if it was his father or Simon. And so on.
"Alright. How are we getting out without them noticing us?" she jerked her thumb toward the stairs, where the living room and the downstairs bedroom were.
His father slept in the living room, and Dr. Fellows slept in the bedroom with the door open so she could hear if any of them tried sneaking out.
"It won't be that hard." He scoffed. "They've been asleep for hours."
"And if your dad put one of those spells up?"
He frowned thoughtfully. His father wouldn't usually do that—unless he thought someone had a reason to go out or come in without them knowing.
"I doubt it, but just in case, I should go out first and say I heard something."
"Oh, and if he decides to go with you, you're going to say you suddenly developed the powers to raise the dead?" She whispered sarcastically.
He rolled his eyes. "No, but we'd go to the other side of the house to look for the so called noises."
"Or, sensibly, we could just say you were Changing and both go together."
"If you want to be like that, we can just tell them you raised them in your sleep." He pointed out sourly, irritated that she was arguing.
Her face flushed with anger. "I told you why I don't want to tell Aunt Lauren about that." She bit her lip, then added, "Yet."
"When, exactly, were you planning on telling her?"
"When I stopped seeing Dr. Davidoff's face in my head every night!"
He grimaced, but hid it against his shoulder. "That's a stupid reason to hide something from someone you want to ask for help."
"Don't call me stupid." She said in a low, dangerous voice.
"I wasn't. I was calling your reasons stupid."
She let out a sound perilously close to a growl. "Go back to your room, Derek, I can find my own way out of the house. I'm sure you're tired."
"I'm not going to go back to bed while you're outside on your own, in the dark, and s-" he held on to that "s" for a long moment before taking a breath.
"Of course I'll be scared," she snapped. "It's dark and there are dead birds or rats or—racoons out there, but I did it, so I'll fix it."
"That was your reasoning for running off in Buffalo and getting your face cut by those punks."
Now the sound she made was like steam coming out of a tea kettle, a high hiss of rage. Then she stalked down the stairs and straight out the front door. When Derek's father didn't wake up, he followed her quickly, wondering why he hadn't just gone back to bed—he was tired, and cranky, and his brain felt murky.
"Let's just-" he cut off in exasperation when she jumped high as he started speaking. "Finish and go back inside."
"Hmph." She huffed, kneeling on the ground in front of what looked like a rotted raccoon. It stumped toward her, so she said, "Stop."
It did.
Derek watched, but the raccoon continued straining against her invisible leash. Ten minutes passed. In that ten minutes, a rabbit managed to crawl its way out from under the house, to join the raccoon...then a cat, dragging the back half of its body came closer and closer.
"Chloe..."
"I know," she said through her teeth. "It was a really rough dream," she muttered, focusing on the cat pawing her leg. "Ease back."
The dead animals listened to her.
"Maybe," Derek suggested some time later, "you should try something else, as this doesn't seem to be working."
"Thanks very much for that, Mr. Einstein. Care to suggest anything?"
"Concentrating? That sounds about right."
"Oh, and I've been sitting here reciting show tunes in my head the whole half hour we've been out here. Silly me, I should be concentrating on the task at hand. How foolish of me, such a blond." She snapped.
He took a breath. "Try just one at a time."
"That's what I always do. The raccoon, I've been trying. It's not working."
"Then try one of the others. There's enough. And it looks like..." He hesitated, squinting and trying to decide if the thing creeping toward them was alive or dead—it was gliding toward them much easier than the other animals. He got to his feet, stance shifting anxiously. He inhaled through his nose, but the scent of dead animals near them was to strong.
"Would you hurry up?" he hissed, then regretted it when Chloe snarled some swear words at him. "I don't think that one's dead," he said by way of explanation.
"Oh, fun." She muttered darkly.
Finally, when the newcomer was a mere five yards away, the animals currently surrounding Chloe in a grisly circle collapsed. She did, too, sinking forward and letting out a long breath. It looked like she was shaking.
Impatient—she'd done this before—Derek grabbed her arm and tugged her to her feet. "We should get inside. I don't know what that is, but it doesn't look like one of your friends."
She laughed humorlessly, letting him drag her into the house. "Let me go," she said quietly. "I'm going to sleep. You should go to your room. Goodnight." She didn't look at him as she said this in one breath.
Slowly, as if he was backing away from a very dangerous animal, Derek released her arm. "Are you alright?"
"I'm tired. I've never raised that many before. There were six." When her voice cracked, she raised her hands to her eyes, startled. There were no tears. "I'm gonna take a shower instead. I feel...dirty."
"I just didn't want you to get hurt," Derek said slowly, unsure of his footing with the Chloe in front of him.
"Yeah," she laughed dryly. "I know." She murmured something that he didn't catch...he thought maybe it was something like, "that's what's so sad," but he wasn't sure.
And so he got defensive. "If you want to go see whatever it was out there, be my guest. I just didn't want it to be dangerous."
"That's not what I was saying. You were being...like that before it showed up." She turned to face him then, and he saw, to his relief, that her eyes were dry.
"We were out there for almost an hour," he pointed out. "I was getting restless."
"Bored," Chloe corrected. "You were getting bored. I know. You didn't have to come. I didn't invite you, you invited yourself to watch the magic show, Derek." Her voice was tired and detached.
"I wasn't bored, I just know what those things do to you, so I wanted you to get rid of them quickly so we could come back inside and go to sleep."
"I'm so glad to know you were concerned." She said flatly. "I'm going to sleep."
"Look," he started furiously.
"I think you should both go to sleep before Lauren wakes up," a new voice said.
Derek jumped and looked behind Chloe to see his father awake, watching them. He realized suddenly that they hadn't been whispering—on the contrary, they're voices had been steadily raising.
"Okay," Chloe said quietly, turning away from them both and going to the upstairs bath.
Derek looked at his father, then shook his head and started walking by.
"Derek, has Chloe been raising things in her sleep?" Kit asked, sounding only curious.
"When she has nightmares about...some things. She hasn't done it in a long time. She's getting better at controlling. it." He said mechanically. "And, obviously, she's still learning how to release them after she summons them."
"Why didn't she tell...anyone about it?"
"Your reactions—everyone's reactions haven't exactly been encouraging." He rubbed a hand down his face. "I'm going to bed," he said quietly, feeling as if something was very, very wrong.
He was pretty sure he and Chloe had just had their first fight as a couple.
Chloe 3rd Person
It had been a few days since the incident with Derek, and Chloe was sure, now, that they had both just been tired and cranky, and that the fight—argument had been totally unjustified on both sides. That didn't stop her from feeling guilty about the things she'd said, the sarcastic tone she'd said them in, or the way she'd glowered at him.
So she convinced her Aunt Lauren to take her out to town to buy some things for him for Valentine's Day, which was only a couple days away.
He had been avoiding her.
No, Chloe corrected, we've been avoiding each other. And that was true enough. They hadn't been hurtfully polite or anything, but it was clear that they weren't spending any extra time with each other. They didn't know how to act after the events of the other night, Chloe admitted. Neither of them knew for sure what to apologize and forgive for, thus, they were stuck at an impossible deadlock.
Well, Chloe thought Valentine's Day was probably the best day to get over it all, especially with a gift of some sort.
"Do you have any idea what you want to get for him?" Lauren asked a little dryly.
Chloe knew being drafted into the make-up mission had not been the highlight of Lauren's day, but she would just have to deal with it.
"No, not really." She admitted, looking at her knees. "I want it to be something...us. Something that he can look at and know that I saw it and thought of him." She glanced over at her. "You know?"
"I'm afraid not." Lauren sighed, then said, "But I'll help you."
They went to multiple stores all around town, and it felt kind of normal. Back when they used to have a girl's day together and go shopping.
They went into a specialty store and looked around for awhile. Chloe wandered away from her aunt, realizing suddenly that she was having trouble picking something because of the company.
In the back, on a tiny shelf, were dozens of bracelets with dozens of charms and decorations on them. They didn't look like girly bracelets, though, and Chloe started looking through the tangles of silver and bronze.
A two sided leather bracelet caught her attention and, looking at it, she smiled. It was perfect.
"I've got it." She said to her aunt as they met in an aisle. "I've got enough money on me right now to get it, too."
"Good." Lauren said a little sharply, but perhaps not as sharp as it had been.
Valentine's Day
"Hey, Chloe, could you come with me for a few?" Derek asked quietly, touching her shoulder.
"Actually, I wanted to give you something first. If you don't mind." She added quickly, averting her gaze.
He was silent for a moment before saying, "Okay. Sure."
They went up to Chloe's and Tori's room, unaware that the other four were in the living room watching like spectators at an intense chess match.
Chloe took a breath and went to her dresser drawer, pulling out the small box she'd found to put the bracelet in, and turned with it in her hands. "I'll understand if you don't like it." She added quickly. "It's just that when I saw it, I thought of you."
Derek frowned down at the little red box and untied the white ribbon sealing it, flipping the top off easily. He lifted the brown leather bracelet and examined it. On the one side, there was a human hand with a heart in the palm. On the other was a wolf's paw print, also with a heart in the center. The hearts were identical to each other, and Derek understood the symbolism.
"I just, I saw the hand, and the paw, and the heart-"
"The heart remains the same. I get it," he said in a voice that had gone oddly husky. "I like it. Thank you." He looked her in the eye. "Really."
She relaxed and smiled at him. "I'm glad."
"Now will you come with me?" he asked as he slid the bracelet onto his wrist and held his hand out for hers.
"Sure." With a relieved smile, she linked her fingers with his and let him lead her down to the basement.
She gasped when they got there. Propped on an end table was a small arrangement of red and pink roses, and a small heart with chocolate in it. There was also a plush bear next to it, with black fur; the front of it showed the bones in white dye, an X-rayed picture of it. She laughed and traced her fingers over it, and in that moment, noticed the TV on and a stack of movies on the DVD player.
She turned toward Derek, who grinned at her and gestured for her to look at them. The Collector, My Soul to Take, Orphan, and about five other horror movies that Chloe hadn't seen were stacked on top of each other.
"I didn't know which ones you liked. I don't know directors and stuff like that. But I don' recall you ever mentioning these, so I thought you'd want to watch them—and judge the director's and special effects and stuff." He swallowed and continued watching her before saying, "Well, do you like it? Would you...want to stay down here and watch some movies with me?"
She looked at the horror movies, the flowers, the chocolate. And raised an eyebrow. "This is all really great, Derek. But I don't know." She stood and surveyed the room. "It looks to me like you had some help."
He shrugged. "Simon decided to help."
"That, I get." She pointed to the bear, picking it up and pressing her cheek to the soft faux fur. "The movies, I get. The flowers, chocolate, the popcorn...I do want to sit down here alone with you for awhile. I just can't see you doing that."
He shrugged again, looking awkward. "Sorry?" Then he sighed heavily. "So I guess you don't want this?" He lifted a small box from the table and waggled it.
Chloe frowned at him and held out her hand. "What is it?"
"Here on planet earth, we open the box to see what it holds," he teased, and Chloe looked up at him to be sure.
Derek was smirking at her, clearly thinking himself so clever.
"Hm." She carefully undid the red ribbon, opening the box and staring. There was a silver chain inside, thin and delicate, but the chain definitely had symbols crafted into it.
"I figured you didn't want to keep wearing your necklace on that ribbon, since I've seen you replace it twice. The symbols are Celtic. They mean "power"." Derek said, watching her face.
Chloe furrowed her brow, calculating in her head. "I love it, Derek. I really, really love it. But how much did this cost? All of this. I mean..."
"I've been saving up for today." He said flatly, then said, "Well, put it on. Please," he added hurriedly.
She rolled her eyes at him, tracing her fingers lightly over the necklace. "Okay. It's terrific." She bit her lip, then reached out to give him a hard shove to push him off balance, then yank him forward again, bringing his mouth down to hers. "Thank you," she said against his mouth.
"Mmhm," he said, hardly noticing as his arms slipped around her.
"You promised me some gore," she pointed out a few minutes later. "Now help me put this on so we can watch that. The popcorn is getting cold." She smirked at the look on his face. "And, of course, if the movie sucks, well, I can think of some other stuff we can do."