A/N: So what's the first thing that needs to happen now that Papa Stilinski knows...? Melissa McCall, you're up!

Coming out simultaneously with this will be the "let's get Isaac into the pack!" fic. As soon as it has a title. To be followed by Erica. And probably more stuff because HELP ME I CAN'T STOP WRITING TEEN WOLF FIC.

Uh, sort of a trigger warning for rape analogies when it comes to being turned into a werewolf though. Sorry about that. Also, my girlfriend has ADD, so Stiles in this chapter is her fault.

Scott's already rethinking his decision not to have Stiles as emotional backup as he sets his foot on the edge of his house's large lawn and smells the hamburgers that she's making. Normally, if he set his mind to filtering out the ambient noise of what's happening around him, he can hear her heartbeat and find it comforting. Today, he can barely hear anything over the thudding of his own heart due to his nerves.

He tries to tell himself that he's faced down Peter, Derek, Chris and Kate Argent, he's been shot repeatedly, he can do this. This should be easy in comparison. He takes a deep breath, crosses the lawn, and goes inside.

"Oh hey!" Melissa shouts from the kitchen. "How was lacrosse practice?"

Scott heads toward her, a little taken off guard, and then tells himself he's being stupid. Just because he's braced for the talk of the century doesn't mean his mother is expecting anything weird. "Not too bad. Jackson's being a dou . . . doofus," he says, catching his bad language at the last minute.

Melissa is clearly not fooled, and arches an eyebrow at him, but lets it go. "How's Stiles doing?"

"He's doing good." Scott winces. "Well. He's doing well." He can just hear Allison correcting him in his head.

A little smirk crosses Melissa's face. "You may pass high school yet," she says, and turns back to the hamburgers she's grilling on their tiny George Foreman. "You hungry? 'Cause these will be ready pretty soon."

"Absolutely." He's a growing werewolf, after all. He sniffs a little. If he's going to out himself, he figures he might as well not have his dinner horrifically overcooked to 'well done'. "Actually, I think I'll just snag mine now," he adds, swooping in. The rarer side of medium is good.

Melissa smacks his knuckles with a fork. "Do I even need to tell you about how much e. coli is in this stuff?"

"Not enough to kill me," Scott says, undeterred. His own burger rescued, although he leaves his mother's cooking, he turns to her with a look that's an odd combination of nervous, sheepish, and serious, a look that only Scott can manage. "But . . . about that. I, uh . . . I wanted to talk to you. Like really talk to you."

She blinks at him. "Really?"

Scott nods. "Really."

"Hallelujah!" She unplugs the grill and steers Scott into a chair, leaving the food on the counter. "Talk," she says, sitting across from him.

Scott eyes the burgers. "I'm not letting you cook those more later under the guise of warming them up," he says, but sits.

"Then you'll eat them cold, bucko. Talk."

Scott can live with that. "Well, see, I'm . . . no, Stiles . . ." He bites his lip. "No. So, the thing is . . ." His fingers tap at the table. "Shit, Mom, I'm awful at this! Everything has been so messed up and there have been tons of secrets and lies, and it's sucked and I don't even know where to start."

She reaches over the table to grip his hands. "Start at the beginning."

"Right. The beginning." He calms down a little. She's his mom. It'll be okay. "So remember back when that body was found in the woods? Laura's body?" he adds, automatically referring to her by name because her memory is treated with respect in their pack.

Melissa nods, looking a little confused to have this as a starting place. "Yeah, I remember that."

"Okay, so, Stiles and I did something really stupid."

"Oh, Lord," Melissa says. "You went out to look for the body. That's it; I am never working night shift again . . ."

Scott huffs out a laugh. Nights weren't so much of a problem anymore. "Yeah, we did, and it was fine in the beginning. We were just, you know, doing something stupid. Then Stiles' dad caught us. Or caught Stiles, but, he knew I was there, you know? Because he's not an idiot. Anyway, we got split up and then I . . ." He has to stop and take a deep breath because this is still difficult. Peter had still done something to him against his will, and no matter how good things are now, it's not a fond memory. "So I got knocked down and bitten by an animal. Or what I thought was an animal. A wolf. Which there aren't any in California. Or at least, not any normal ones."

"Okay . . ." Melissa says, now well and truly baffled about where this story is going.

"And I thought it was no big deal. Maybe I stumbled too close to the den. It's not like it's the first time I've been bitten by an animal. So I just cleaned it up and moved on. But . . . then I was suddenly good at lacrosse. Like, Jackson level of good. And I could breathe, and my hearing and sense of smell were out of this world and it was crazy."

"It . . . sounds crazy, all right."

Scott charged ahead for another minute. "And it all would have been fine, awesome, or so I thought, except Peter wanted . . ." He trails off. "You don't believe me." He nods. "Okay."

"Well, I'm sorry, honey, but I'm still not even sure what you're trying to tell me and I don't see what this has to do with anything that's been going on, in addition to how insane it all sounds. Like you got bitten by a radioactive spider and now you have superpowers."

"I'm trying to tell you about how I got all tangled up in this mess with two, two psychotic murderers, and how everything is different now, and there's a, a family, a pack, and things are finally . . ." He stops because he's babbling again. He pulls one hand free from his mother's hold, leaving the other where it is. "Tell me you won't freak out."

"I'm already pretty freaked out, but I'll try to stay calm," Melissa says.

Scott holds his hand up and shifts enough to show claws.

Melissa stares, fascinated, watching the claws come out. "That's . . . how did you . . ." She can't seem to finish the question.

"I'm a werewolf, mom."

Melissa shakes his head. "You, you, do you think this is funny? Do, do you think that – "

"Mom! Mom, I've got claws." He gestures with that hand, keeping it a safe distance from his mother. "No, I don't think it's funny. Do you need to see the teeth? The pointed ears, the fur? If you want to see a hundred and forty-some-odd pound wolf sitting in your kitchen, I can do that for you."

"No! No, I don't want to see that, who would want to see that?" Melissa pushes back from the table. "Jesus. I need a drink. Only my son would manage to, to get turned into a werewolf!"

Scott slams back from the table like his mother had just slapped him. "Manage to?! You . . . you make it sound like I just let it happen and now I'm some sort of . . . I didn't ask for this! Peter did this to me! He attacked me and did this to me without my permission! Just like he did to Lydia! But because I wasn't bleeding everywhere in a pretty dress, it's suddenly something I just let happen?"

"Oh . . . oh, honey," Melissa says, nearly choking the words out. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way, I just . . . this is kind of a lot to take in."

Scott nods a little, not sure if he's accepting her apology or agreeing with her or just indicating that he has physically heard what she said. He wants a hug, because that's the sort of comfort he's used to, now that the idea of pack is something good for him. But he won't ask for one, so he just hugs his arms over his stomach and says nothing.

Melissa is not inobservant, however, and after a moment she walks over and wraps her arms around her son, squeezing him tightly. "It's going to be okay, Scott. Whatever . . . whatever's going on, whatever you need, we'll get it for you. Okay? I promise. It's going to be okay."

He nods against her shoulder and lets himself be hugged for a minute, just soaking it in, before hugging back. "It's not bad now. Peter's gone. Kate's gone." There might have been a sniffle. "I'm sorry I yelled at you."

"You don't need to be sorry for that." Melissa rubs his back. "I was kind of . . . I just shouldn't have said that. Okay?" She steers him back towards his chair. "Now start at the beginning . . . again . . . and stop dancing around the werewolf thing."

He sits, and starts over. He tells her the whole story this time. It's a bit disjointed, because he isn't a very good storyteller, and there's a lot of emotional flailing, but he tells it. And this time he uses everyone's names all the way through, which makes him swallow hard and hiccup here and there because it takes the cushion away. The body can no longer be anonymous. She's truly Laura Hale, Derek's sister, his alpha, and now Scott knows what that really means and how hard the loss of a loved alpha could hit, let alone sister and only family. 'The wolf' is Peter from beginning to end, and that makes him curl in on himself, because 'the wolf' is now a person and stripped of all innocence of action. He doesn't dare look at his mother when talking about the times he was hurt or shot, either, or the times that he misjudged Derek so badly. But he does tell her everything.

Melissa sits there the whole time and keeps her jaw firmly clenched when her stomach wants to leap into her throat. She murmurs a sympathetic comment here and there, and tries to keep everything straight when Scott jumps around. She sits across the table and holds his hands, and makes sure not to express incredulity at anything, even the least believable parts, because she's sure he's telling the truth. He's her son, and she knows him, and he would never make up a story like this.

"Well," she says, when it's clear that he's brought her up to date, "you know, this is going to sound crazy, but . . . this is actually a huge relief to me. Werewolf pack and all."

Scott looks up at her cautiously. "Uh, it is? Because . . . that's not what I expected. And that's even taking into account my new definition of crazy."

Melissa lets out a sigh, a release of tension that brings her almost to the point of tears. "My God, Scott, I was so worried about you. I thought you were, were on drugs, or mixed up in a gang, or, or, developing a mental illness like schizophrenia. I didn't know what to think. And it turns out all that time you were just . . . looking out for your friends. Trying to do the right thing. Being Scott." Now she is crying a little. "That is such a Goddamn relief."

This time it's Scott who moves around the table and does the hugging. "I didn't mean to worry you. I really didn't. I thought, we thought, that if we kept you and Mr. Stilinski out of it, you would worry less, and be in less danger."

She hugs him tightly and presses his cheek against his hair. "Yes, well," she says, "sometimes you aren't very bright, Scott. You know?"

Scott gives an amused huff. "Stiles, Derek, and Lydia don't let me forget. Allison respects my fragile ego."

"Good for her." Melissa gives him another squeeze. "Also: you're grounded."

"What for? Exactly?"

"Lying to me. And don't say you didn't lie to me, bucko! Omission is just as bad, if not worse, and there have to have been at least a few times in there when you just flat out lied to my face." She gives him a gentle whap upside the head. "So. You are grounded, mister. No, uhm, no TV for a week. A month! No TV for a month."

"I wasn't going to argue!" Scott protests. "I just wanted to know what it was in that entire disaster that I was grounded for." There was a pause, and then somewhat sheepishly, "Does grounded mean I can't go to Stiles' house? Please don't do that. Everything else, okay, but everyone goes over there."

Melissa folds her arms over her chest and says, "Well, I guess your pack will just have to come here, now won't they."

Scott nods, invested in making his mother happy. "Uh . . . even overnight? Sometimes . . . we do that." Sometimes any one of them could use a packmate to sleep next to.

"Wolf slumber parties?" Melissa seems amused by this concept.

"Sort of?"

Melissa narrows her eyes. "Are you hiding things again, or just being evasive by accident?"

"Both? Neither?" He flaps a hand at her while trying to think before speaking. "It's not for fun. We're a new pack, so I think it makes us want to stick close to each other. And," he stops here, trying to think of a way to explain that they all sort of have the screaming meemies sometimes (except Derek, who has angry hysterics) without spilling other people's secrets. "This was all such a mess for some of us, it's better to have someone nearby at night."

"Uh huh." Melissa smiles suddenly. "So you sleep close to each other for comfort and you, being a guy, didn't want to have to say that to your mother?"

"Maybe." Scott grins. "That and sometimes Derek forgets he should think about pants."

Melissa folds her hands under her chin and says, "If you weren't so head over heels for Allison, that comment would make me suspicious. Actually it does, but sort of in a different way. You don't have to answer this if you don't want to, but, well – do Derek and Stiles have, you know, a thing?"

Scott's eyebrows came down as he thought about that question and how to answer. It isn't a secret, whatever 'it' is, but it's not exactly easy to explain. "Sort of. Yes." He nods firmly, because he's started thinking about how they share the pack, and that lets him start thinking like a wolf, and the way they smell when they're together. Content. Stiles is less stressed and Derek is closer to happy. The way gravity pulls them together, the way it had pulled him towards Allison. But they never have the scent of lust, or sex; at least, Stiles never has it near Derek. It shows up near pretty girls often enough. "Yeah, they do. But uh, Stiles is straight, if that's what you were asking. Though he's finally over Lydia! And Derek is sort of a second alpha, since Stiles isn't actually a wolf, and Derek knows a lot since he was born as one."

"So they're more like partners than boyfriends," Melissa says, wanting to make sure she has this straight.

"Maybe? How do you mean 'partners'?"

"Well . . ." Melissa thinks it over. "I guess in this circumstance, it would mean almost like parents. The two of them run everything together. They're friends, but more than friends, but not boyfriends."

"Kinda, yeah," Scott says, although he's noticed that Stiles isn't really looking around anymore. At least, nothing beyond a general appreciation of the scenery.

Seeing his hesitation, Melissa smiles a little and says, "Maybe you need to speak 'wolf' before you can understand it."

"That could be it." In a moment of blind honesty, because this was his mother here, he adds, "Or it could be because we're all pretty screwed up at this point."

She shakes her head at him and says, "Eat your dinner."

Scott nods and stands, and the first thing he does is plug the grill back in for his mother. Then he starts assembling a sandwich for himself. "So . . . how long am I grounded for?"

Melissa narrows her eyes at him. "Why don't you tell me how long you think would be appropriate?"

Scott cringes. Every teenager on the planet knows that there is no correct answer to that question. "I dunno. Some of this was self-punishing. I mean, I got shot and stuff."

Melissa folds her arms over her chest and gives him a look with raised eyebrows.

Realizing that this was absolutely the wrong thing to say, Scott verbally scrambles to fix his mistake. "But it's okay! It didn't even leave a mark!" Then he thinks of the slowly fading scar from the wolfsbane bullet to the belly. "Or it won't in the end. Oh God, I'm making it worse."

"Yes, yes you are," Melissa says. "If we're going to bring that into it, I'd be tempted to ground you twice as long for each time you got hurt."

"It was only twice." Scott winces. "I guess grounding me for as long as all this was going on would be fair."

"Oh, Lord," Melissa says. "Stiles would eat me out of house and home if he had to come over here every night because you were grounded for, what, three months?" She takes a deep breath and taps her fingers on the table, watching Scott devour his hamburger, because no matter what else is going on, he's still a growing boy. "Okay. You are grounded from TV for a month, and you're grounded from your phone and from going out for a week."

"Only a week?" Scott leans over the table to give her a surprised hug.

"Because you tried to do what you thought was best," she says, "and because you didn't ask for any of this. Yes. Only a week."

"Okay." Scott pulls his phone out, but pauses as he's about to hand it over. "Can I text everyone first, to let them know to come here tonight?"

Melissa considers. "You may text Stiles," she says. "He can tell everyone else."

Scott nods, not about to argue, and gets with the texting. 'Grounded and lost phone privileges for a week. Mom says the pack can come over. Gotta go.'

Melissa lets him hang onto the phone until Stiles replies, which he does a minute later with, 'I'll let everyone know the party's at the McCall house tonite!"

Scott taps out a quick, 'No party! Grounded!' and hands the phone over to his mother. "It's not my fault," he tells her.

She looks at the screen and lets out a snort of laughter. "Don't worry, Scott; I don't hold you responsible for Stiles."

"Thank God."

They go back to eating their dinner, and less than twenty minutes later, Stiles shows up with Lydia in tow. "Hi, Ms. McCall!" he says, bouncing into the house with his usual lack of what might be considered courtesy. Lydia is just rolling her eyes as she follows him inside. Stiles looks at Scott and says, "I can't believe you actually told her," then holds his hand out for a fist bump.

Scott knocks their fists together but gives Stiles a look like he's the slow one. "Dude, you kinda told me to. If I hadn't, you and your dad were going to make me. I could tell." He leans around Stiles to give Lydia a smile in greeting.

"And I totally expected we would have to do that," Stiles says with a nod. "Hey, hamburgers? Awesome." He commences stuffing his face.

Lydia rolls her eyes and says, politely, "Thank you for having us, Ms. McCall."

Scott looked over at Lydia and asks, "Have you eaten? I can make more burgers. And there's one left that hasn't been cooked to death." He's a little nervous, shifting slightly. "Is Allison coming?" He assumes that Derek is, but Derek will get there in his own time, because Derek can be a jerk like that.

"She said she'll be over as soon as she's done with her homework," Stiles says with his mouth full. "And yeah, we ate at my place," he adds, not seeming to realize how inconsistent that statement is with the fact that he's already inhaled half a hamburger and is clearly thinking about putting together a second one.

Scott gives his mom an apologetic smile and looks in the fridge for other food. "Does anyone want anything to drink? By 'anyone' I mean 'Lydia'," he adds. Stiles is on his own.

"Just water," Lydia says, as Stiles shoulders Scott aside to reach for a can of Coke and a Tupperware of mystery leftovers. "Stiles, did you take your Adderall today?"

"Nah, I slept too late," Stiles says, opening the Tupperware and giving it a sniff. "That obvious?" he adds, sticking it in the microwave to reheat.

"Dude, you are eating all the things," Scott says, and reaches for his phone to ask Derek to bring cookies, or chips, or the snack aisle of a grocery store. He's seen Stiles get like this before after a long spell of high-dose Adderall, when he finally eases off of it long enough to realize he hasn't eaten in a week. Then he remembers that he doesn't have his phone. He sighs and reminds himself that it's his own fault. "Can one of you ask Derek or Allison to pick up something to snack on, and some caffeine, on their way here? I'll pay them back," he adds, figuring that he shouldn't make his mother pay for all the food.

"Oh! I will!" Stiles whips out his phone and starts texting. "I want, uhm, I want those Little Debbie snack cakes and microwave burritos and, hm, and waffles. And . . . oranges. Yeah, definitely oranges."

Lydia gives Scott a somewhat skeptical look. "Caffeine? For him?"

"And a twelve pack of Mountain Dew," Scott reminds Stiles, who's still texting away. "Oh my God, Stiles, drink the Coke." After that, he turns and blinks at Lydia for a few moments. He's become used to her knowing pretty much everything. Then he shrugs and scoots a little closer to her, closer than the social norm although they both seem comfortable with it. "ADD, which is what Stiles has, and ADHD, are an understimulation of the central nervous system. Not overstimulation, the way a lot of people assume. That's why people with it bounce and fidget and jitter, and their minds are everywhere at once. They're trying to make up the difference." He shrugs a little. "Most ADD meds are a form of amphetamines. Stimulants actually make people with ADD calmer. So if Stiles is ever without his psych meds, just ply him with caffeine."

"See, Scott, I told you it would be a party," Stiles says, smirking at him as he takes the Tupperware out of the microwave and sticks his face into it.

"You're lucky my mother is forgiving," Scott says, shooting her a nervous glance before peering in the Tupperware to try to figure out what it is.

"Actually, I'm rather enjoying this," Melissa says, smiling at him. "It's good to see you and Stiles back to normal."

Stiles' phone buzzes and he says, "Okay, Allison's bringing the food. She'll be here in about half an hour." To Melissa, he says, "Derek will show up late. Because he's a creature of the night," he adds, in an outrageous Bela Lugosi accent.

Scott mutters something that sounds suspiciously like, "Just as long as he uses the door."

They manage to pry Stiles out of the kitchen long enough to sit down with a game of Scrabble, since Scott can't watch TV and Melissa has decided that video games count as they are played on the TV. ("No computer games, either," she says, which will obviously need to be on the honor system as he needs the computer for school.) Scott is half-heartedly making words like 'ball' and 'cat' because he doesn't really care, while Lydia and Stiles make words like 'placebo' and 'admiral' for the extra 'used all the letters' bonus. Melissa watches this game in amusement and occasionally gives Scott a hint.

Not long after that, the doorbell rings and Scott finds Allison on the other side with one of her smiles, several grocery bags, and two twelve packs of soda. "Hi," she says. "I got everything Stiles asked for and then some normal things for the rest of us."

Scott beams and hugs her close, inhaling her scent and kissing her cheek. "Thanks." He let her into the house and grabs the soda packs from the porch. "We're playing Scrabble. I've been grounded from TV," he explains, as they make their way to the kitchen.

"Scrabble? With Stiles and Lydia?" Allison lets out one of her warm laughs. "You couldn't talk them into something like 'Chutes and Ladders'?"

"I was hoping for something in between like Monopoly, but I was outvoted. And then Stiles started putting down words like 'decimate'." He gives a put-upon sigh. "Besides, Chutes and Ladders? And to think that earlier I was telling my mother that you're respectful of my fragile ego."

Allison gives him a rather wicked smile and says, "Maybe we could find a better game for just the two of us . . ."

"Oh hey guys is that Mountain Dew? Did you get my Little Debbies?" Stiles zooms into the kitchen, grabs one of the grocery bags and a twelve-pack of soda right out of Scott's hands. "You'd better get back in here, Scott, it's your turn and your mom might get suspicious if you take much longer to say hello," he adds, then zooms back into the living room.

"I think that's a no," Scott says, with a laugh. "Do you still have all your fingers? And thanks for bringing this stuff, by the way." He puts the pack of Sprite on the table and gets one for himself.

"No problem." She gives him another kiss. "And my fingers are fine. Should we go say hi to your mother and team up at Scrabble?"

"You mean, should I let you save me? Yes, yes we should." He curls his hand around hers and they head into the living room.

Stiles is already elbow-deep in a bag of Cheetos, and has the open pack of Mountain Dew next to him. "I took your turn for you," he says, his mouth full. "You got thirty-six points. You're welcome."

Allison just smiles slightly and says, "Hi, Ms. McCall. Thanks for letting Scott have us over."

"I didn't want to ruin what he seemed to think was a working system," Melissa says, watching in amusement as Scott nearly loses his hand at the wrist while snagging some Cheetohs from the bag before returning it to Stiles.

Lydia makes a 'tsk' noise at Stiles and sets to work peeling one of the oranges. Allison just laughs and sits down next to Scott, curling her legs underneath herself and linking a hand through his arm. Stiles leans over to greet her properly, touching his cheek to hers in what seems to Melissa to be a strange parody of an animal greeting. He does this completely without any sense of shame or impropriety. Scott's eyes skip up to his mother to see her reaction to the normal pack greeting. Her eyebrows are raised slightly, but then she flips another page of her magazine.

Another little knot of tension that Scott hasn't realized was there melts away. Stiles greeting Allison like that in front of his mother gave all of them permission to act 'normally', and his mother's basic non-reaction to it swept away even more worry. He reaches out and nudges Lydia, no longer bothering to keep a normal distance. "Watch it. Stiles might take your fingers off to get to that orange."

Lydia gives him an arch look and says, "I'm aware. It's not for me. I was afraid he would try to eat it whole." She pulls apart the orange and holds a slice of it out to Stiles, who drops his bag of Cheetohs and grabs it.

"Must be vitamin C deficient," he says, as Lydia feeds him another slice.

Scott shrugs. "Maybe. Vitamins usually aren't an issue, with what you feed your dad. Have you weighed yourself lately? Maybe you just need food."

"Obviously I need food," Stiles says, accepting another orange slice. Melissa is watching this with some veiled interest. She doesn't think she's ever heard Scott take such a, well, mothering tone with Stiles before. And Stiles has certainly never accepted it before. "I just apparently really want oranges. Or maybe I just really want Lydia to feed me, right?" he asks, grinning at her. She just rolls her eyes at him.

Scott lets out a snort of laughter. "You've wanted that for years," he says, peering at his letter tiles.

"And now I have it!" Stiles says.

Scott and Allison have a brief, heated conference about what they can spell with their letters, which Scott inevitably loses, and have just taken their turn when the doorbell rings. Stiles glances up and grins. "It's Derek, I'll get it," he says, scrambling to his feet and practically jumping over the table rather than going around it, as Scott shakes his head at his friend.

"I didn't know that he knew what doorbells were for!" Allison says brightly.

"Don't give him too many points," Scott says, making a face. "Now he's making fun of me."

"What'd he say?" Allison asks.

"I said," Derek says from the door to the living room, "that he got himself grounded. That's just a statement of fact." He says this with measured dignity, apparently oblivious to the fact that Stiles has his arms wrapped around his shoulders and is attempting to get a piggy-back ride but is mostly just hanging on Derek's back ineffectually.

"It was your tone," Scott argues, but there's really no challenge in his voice or on his face. He does make a face at Stiles. "Dude, stop trying to climb Derek before you hurt someone. Like yourself."

"He likes it," Stiles says, smirking.

Derek simply reaches around, grabs Stiles by the back of the shirt, and pries him off without commentary. He dumps Stiles back into the seat he had come from and then turns to Melissa McCall with that charming grin he can muster every once in a while, when the occasion calls for it. "It's nice to meet you, Ms. McCall. I've heard a lot about you."

"Dude, cut it out," Stiles says, as the rest of the pack gives Derek a somewhat unnerved look. "You're scaring the kids."

Derek's grin fell away. "It's called being polite and making a good impression."

"You look like a serial killer," Stiles says cheerfully, patting the seat next to him.

Melissa bites back a grin, stands, and shakes Derek's hand. "It's nice to meet you, Derek. Thanks for helping take care of Scott when you could. I know he can make it difficult."

"Hey!" Scott protests immediately. Not because his mother was wrong, exactly, but because Derek didn't exactly make things easy either.

Melissa just gives him a look, but Derek says, "I don't really deserve that much credit, but thanks." Then he sits down next to Stiles, sees that he's about to make some sort of commentary, and takes the orange from Lydia, shoving the remaining half into Stiles' mouth. That causes Scott to crack up, and he forgives Derek for making fun of him. Stiles just chews busily for a minute, while Derek greets Lydia and Allison, and then, grudgingly, Scott. Then he spits orange seeds into Derek's face.

Allison is giggling madly, so Scott jumps in. "Derek, you're not allowed to murder him in our living room. Stiles, stop trying to make him want to."

"Oh, I won't murder him," Derek says. "Then I'd be stuck as your alpha, and we've seen how well that goes."

Melissa's eyebrows hike up. "And how does that go?"

"Kinda like Mr. Stilinski and veggie burgers," Scott says.

"Hey," Stiles says, "one of these days, he is going to learn to like those damned things."

"Yes," Lydia says, "on the day that they invent one that's made of beef. Oh wait . . ."

Now Allison's laughing again. "Veggie burgers are pretty awful. I've tried one."

They continue to bicker amiably for a while. Derek refuses to join the Scrabble game because he knows he'll only lose, and instead sits there with Stiles slowly slumping further and further over, occasionally misspelling words. Lydia and Allison stare at the three empty cans of soda that Stiles has gone through with somewhat perplexed looks on their faces. Scott isn't in the least bit surprised, but doesn't bother to say anything. He's busy trying to figure out if they'll all really fit into his bed, which is a bit smaller than Stiles'.

Before much longer, Stiles is asleep, his face comfortably mashed into Derek's shoulder, with the older man absently rubbing his back. Melissa glances up and gives a little smile. "So he still does that, huh," she said. "I think Stiles could fall asleep during anything."

"Up to and including fireworks," Scott says, for the pack's amusement.

Derek stands, picking Stiles up in a princess carry, which makes both girls giggle again. "I'll take him up to bed," he says, and exits the room without another word.

"That part is new," Melissa muses.

"Wish we had it on film," Scott says, as he puts the Scrabble board away and started to clean up the living room. "Derek won't be back," he adds to his mother.

"Mm hm," Melissa says. "Well, it is getting late. I think I'll head to bed myself." She stands up, then leans over and gives Scott a hug. "You kids behave yourselves. I'll see you in the morning."

He hugs her back tightly. "G'night, mom. Love you." Screw guy shame. After everything else that was said today, he's allowed to tell his mother that he loves her.