/ she always had a plan
I.
Even at the young age of four, Laura Hale was acutely aware of the fact that she was the favored child in her family. Her four older brothers were fiercely protective of her, and likewise her two sisters doted on her far beyond what was necessary. Her parents had a way of giving her everything she wanted before she'd even asked for it, and she was downright spoiled by her extended family.
Her favorite uncle, her dad's younger brother Peter, always said she'd be unstoppable as an alpha, since she already had the world wrapped around her finger.
There was a subtle shift one day. It seemed as though her family was tiptoeing around her, and perceptive as ever, Laura had the feeling that they were all in on some big secret. A few short days later, her father called their family together.
He began a long speech about how he and his mate –Laura's mother – were getting older, and how he'd never expected that they'd be given one last miracle. Everyone seemed to catch on to what was being implied at that point but Laura, something that irritated her greatly.
She usually remained seated in Peter's lap during meetings, since he was the only one who'd play games with her when things became too dull for her attention span. However, on that day, she quickly scooted out of her uncle's grasp before he could catch her and ran over to her mother, leaping into her arms.
"Mama, what's happening?" she asked.
"Laura, honey, there's going to be a new baby," she whispered, planting a soft kiss on the top of her daughter's messy cloud of dark hair.
The room seemed to hold its breath as Laura processed this information. "A new baby?" she asked, her pale eyes going wide.
"That's right. A new brother or sister."
In the blink of an eye, Laura took off. From the living room, the adults could hear her stomping up the stairs.
It was Peter who stood up first. "I'll go get her," he volunteered, quickly travelling to the second story of the Hale house to find Laura in the closet of her bedroom, frantically trying to get the old crib stuck out of the corner.
Noticing her uncle's presence, she turned to him and gestured for him to help with a wave of her hand. "Come on, Uncle Peter," she insisted. "Mama says there's a new baby coming and she's not even ready for him yet."
Peter laughed and scooped her up in his arms. "We've got time, kid. Plenty and plenty of time."
Laura's parents never fully understood how excited she was by the thought of having a younger sibling. They tried to pacify her in every way they could think of, even letting her pick a name for the new baby.
She announced one morning to Peter that she wanted the baby to be named Laura, because she wanted her new sibling to know that she would share everything with him or her.
Sensing her good intentions, Peter wisely suggested she consider sharing her middle name with the baby – Erika.
And thus Derek Hale was born.
II.
At the age of 22, Derek Hale decided there were two kinds of people in the world, and everyone else just fell somewhere in the middle.
There were the people who always knew what to do, who everyone loved, who never did anything even remotely wrong. On the opposite end of the spectrum, there were the people who ruined everything they touched, who couldn't get along with anyone to save their life, who seemed to invent new and creative ways to screw things up miserably on a regular basis.
When deciding to name these two groups, he'd decided that calling them the Lauras and the Dereks was most fitting.
And if the name didn't give it away, all it took was one look at his crumbling house, his utter lack of accomplishments, and his apparent lack of a plan for the future to figure out what kind of person Derek was.
He'd woken up that morning and rolled out of bed approximately two seconds before the ceiling caved in where he'd been just moments before. It was a painful reminder of the fact that he needed to make a decision – to fix up the Hale house and commit to staying in Beacon Hills or move on.
Derek had never been good at deciding between two alternatives. When given the choice of A or B, he tended to choose C and hope for the best. In this case, where A was staying and B was leaving, C was putting off making a decision until one was forcibly made for him.
Quickly changing out of his dust-covered clothes, Derek headed down the stairs, each creak a painful reminder of the fact that eventually the house was just going to cave down around him.
As he approached the bottom of the stairwell, the doorbell rang. Anyone he would have been okay with seeing would have simply knocked and walked in – meaning that this was undoubtedly someone unwelcome. Probably a Girl Scout hell bent on selling 500 boxes of cookies so she could get a free bike or something.
Speculating on who could possibly be at the door distracted Derek to the point where he forgot that the last step was rotting away and put his foot right on the weak wood, which easily buckled under his weight. After a great deal of cursing – though he tried to keep his volume low for the Girl Scout – he marched down the hall to the door, yanking it open.
To his embarrassment, the door completely came off the wall, hinges and all. Groaning, Derek tossed it aside and stepped out onto the deck, hoping the Girl Scout didn't think he was some kind of homeless person who shouldn't be trusted to pay for his cookies. He really did like the minty ones.
However, instead of a Girl Scout, a girl just a bit older than Derek was leaning on the railing. Her dirty blonde hair was pulled into a messy bun on the top of her head, and her bright blue eyes stared at Derek with an accusatory glint that made him wonder just what he'd done wrong.
Then he noticed the leash that extended from her hand to one of the largest, ugliest dogs he'd ever seen. It vaguely resembled a Husky, though it was bigger than any one Derek had ever seen, and its fur was a dull orange color. When it saw Derek, it gave a loud bark and began panting eagerly.
Okay, it truly was the definition of irony, but Derek had always thought of himself as more of a cat person.
"Derek Hale?" the girl asked, a certain briskness to her voice that made Derek feel like he needed to answer as quickly as possible.
"That's me," he said, wondering what was coming next.
At first Derek thought she was thrusting her hand out for him to shake; then he realized she was holding out the dog leash. "I'm Scarlet, your sister's friend from med school. Maybe she told you about me?"
"We weren't really that close."
"Right," Scarlet said, something resembling a grimace settling on her face. "Well, this sounds crazy, but I finally read the letter she left me in case…" she trailed off. Derek got the feeling Scarlet was a girl who didn't make a habit of leaving sentences unfinished. Death did that to people. "Anyway, this is Bez, the stray dog she adopted. She wanted you to have her."
Reluctantly, Derek took the leash when it became obvious Scarlet wasn't going to back down. Bez obediently padded over to Derek, licking his hand and barking a few more times.
"She's really well-behaved, and she's housebroken. She knows how to sit, speak, fetch, play dead…you know, all that stuff. The only thing is she eats like a horse. Laura decided that she's an Alaskan Malamute with a touch of Saint Bernard, you know, since she's so big," Scarlet continued. "I've been taking care of her since Laura…"
"Died," Derek said bluntly.
"You know, I didn't see you at her funeral," Scarlet said, placing a hand on her hip. "Was Urban Outfitters having a sale that day?"
Derek flinched, mostly because Laura used to make the same comment about his monochromatic wardrobe. "Actually, the police thought I killed her and I was sitting in jail," Derek said flatly.
"And you didn't? Kill her, I mean."
"Obviously not."
Scarlet sighed and shook her head. "Okay, well, you have the dog now. Try to take good care of her – she's been really down since Laura died." Derek swore she put an added emphasis on the last word. And without saying anything else, she stomped down the porch and got in her car, driving off without any kind of goodbye.
Derek watched her drive away, then turned to the dog that was suddenly his. "Do you think I look like I shop at Urban Outfitters?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
Bez barked and wagged her tail eagerly.
"Well your opinion doesn't count. You were Laura's dog; of course you'd be on her side." The people who knew her always took her side – she was just one of those people.
Just setting a perfect example for all the other goddamn Lauras of the world.
III.
From the moment Derek was born, Laura absolutely loved him. She insisted that her parents place his crib in her room so he wouldn't be alone. More than once, her mother had rushed into the room when she heard Derek crying only to find Laura leaning over the side of the crib, singing a lullaby to her little brother.
As Derek got older, Laura taught him everything she knew about the world. To her, it was thrilling to be able to be the teacher instead of the student. When he was four and she was eight, she was the one who got to teach him how to control his changes.
And on the full moons when he couldn't, she used the excuse to turn into a wolf as well and run around the woods with him. They'd wake up in the mornings as humans out in the middle of nowhere, their backs instinctively pressed against each other to keep warm.
One morning Derek woke up with a deep cut in his palm, probably from broken glass that his wolf form had ignored. Before he could even recognize the pain, Laura grabbed his hand and ran a gentle finger over the gash, smiling as the skin knitted back together.
Derek didn't notice how the effort made the veins in her arms bulge out and turn a dark color or the way she winced as she stood up and followed him back to the house.
Laura didn't mind that he didn't realize how much she did for him. Everyone put her on a pedestal – including Derek – but at least the way she treated him made her feel like she deserved a small fraction of the worship she received.
Because in the end, people loved her because she had a pretty face and knew how to act in order to get what she wanted. Derek was the one with the good heart, if only people would look beyond the tough shell he put around himself.
Until then, she was happy to keep him to herself.
IV.
From the moment Bez officially became his, Derek decided that in the last five years of Laura's life – the ones during which they'd only had scattered conversations here and there – she'd completely forgotten every last aspect of his personality.
Because honestly, why the hell would someone think it was a good idea to give him a dog?
For a while, Bez had been content to roam around the house, sniffing everything. A few hours later, she began whimpering and padding around the kitchen. Now she followed him everywhere, giving him a pleading look with her big brown eyes.
It wasn't until his own stomach growled that Derek figured out what she needed. "Okay, I have to go to the store and get food and stuff for you," he said, giving her a stern look. "I'm not going to tie you up, but if you run off while I'm gone, I will not go looking for you. Understand?"
Bez barked a few times before running up the stairs, presumably resuming her exploration of the dusty old house. Derek took that as a sign that she understood what he'd meant.
Beacon Hills was a town just big enough to have a Wal-Mart. He could have gone to the vet and gotten an opinion on what kind of dog food was the best, but the stuff there was probably marked up way beyond what was reasonable, and he also liked not having to talk to anyone as he shopped.
Derek found the pet aisle quickly and decided that the bag of food with the biggest dog on the cover was probably his best bet. He also got a few toys and nice dishes for food and water. On a whim, he grabbed a book as he walked to the checkout: Home Renovations for Dummies.
When he got home, he was mildly surprised that Bez didn't run to greet him. He tossed his purchases on the counter and headed upstairs. "Bez?" he called out.
He heard a bark from one of the rooms and followed it to find Bez sitting on the mattress in the guest bedroom – essentially his bedroom, now that the old one had collapsed. "Yeah, no," Derek said, shaking his head. "This is my bed." Then he realized he hadn't gotten her a kennel, or a cushion, or whatever the hell you were supposed to get your dog.
"Come on, I got you food," he said, and she followed him downstairs to the kitchen, daintily skipping over the newly broken last step.
He tore open the bag of food with his claws and dumped a bunch in her bowl, grabbing the other and filling it with bottled water. Derek hadn't paid his utility bills at all since coming to Beacon Hills. He snuck into Stiles' house when no one was home to shower and usually stole food from Scott's house when he thought he could get away with it.
While Bex ate, Derek opened his book and looked through the first few chapters. He was just getting into it when Bez hopped up on the chair next to his and leaned her head over the book. She panted a bit, getting drool all over the page. "Bez!" Derek shouted, pushing her head back. "Really?"
She whimpered and gave him a look that almost looked apologetic before jumping up on the table and nudging the book with her nose, almost like she was nodding at him.
"You only say that because you're on Laura's side," he said, fully aware that he was talking to a dog as if she could both speak to him and understand what he was saying back to her.
Bez barked and leapt down from the table, sticking her head in the bag of dog food and noisily eating more. Derek shook his head. Not for the first time, he wondered why Laura had thought it would be a good idea to stick him with this mutt.
Then he realized that if Laura had left instructions for her friend to give Bez to him, she'd had to have given her friend an address where he'd be at.
And if she'd assumed he would be here, this must be where she wanted him to stay.
Well, it was as good a reason as any to stay in Beacon Hills, even if it was a stretch. If things didn't go so well, he could always blame it on the fact that it had been Laura who'd wanted him to be here, not himself.
That night, he let Bez share his bed. In a way, it was extremely annoying having to share space with a giant fuzzy lump that snored, but at the same time, it kind of reminded Derek of the times he and Laura would fall asleep in the woods during the full moon, waking up knowing there'd be hell to pay for wandering off.
In the morning he decided it was time to start fixing up the house, if not for himself, then for Bez. It was only fair to show her that her former master hadn't grown up in some kind of hazardous waste dump.
Because it was way easier to tell himself that than admit he might just be getting a soft spot for this dog.
V.
In hindsight, Laura realized she might have overreacted…just a bit.
She'd come home from college for Christmas break and had decided to pick Derek up from school as a surprise. As soon as the final bell rang, kids began pouring out of the school, but there was no sign of her younger brother. She waited until nearly all the kids had left before reluctantly turning off the engine of her brand new Camaro – a graduation gift from her parents.
No sooner had she entered the school and turned down the hallway that contained most of the lockers than she saw her baby brother locked in a very passionate embrace with a girl.
She quietly cleared her throat and told Derek she was there to drive him home. He'd gotten embarrassed, followed her to her car, and explained everything on the way home.
At least that was what she wished she would have handled things.
What Laura really did was march up to her brother, grab him by the ear, and pull him the entire way to her car. "What the hell, Laura? Ow, ow, ow! Can you just let go, please?" he'd shouted at her as she pulled him across the parking lot before slamming him against the passenger door.
That was probably where the mysterious dent had come from.
"You want to explain why you had your tongue down some girl's throat in the middle of the hallway?" Laura demanded, feeling little bubbles of rage form in her stomach and make their way to her brain.
"Her name's Kate Argent, and she's my girlfriend," Derek said, attempting to shove his sister back.
Too bad she'd always been stronger than him.
"I go away for three months and suddenly my little brother's got a girlfriend?" she asked, her voice rising. "And you never thought this was worth mentioning on the phone? Wait, what did you say her name was?"
"Kate Argent."
"Chris' younger sister?" Laura asked, narrowing her eyes. "Look, something's up with that family. If Kate's anything like her brother, she's probably already riding the crazy train."
"You can't just come back and pretend you know everything, Laura. God, you're so annoying," Derek said, pushing against her again. This time, she let him go and let him storm away.
"Where are you going?" she shouted after him.
"Home."
"I can drive you."
"Just because you have a fancy car now and offer me a ride doesn't mean I'm going to forget that you abandoned me, Laura," he shouted over his shoulder.
Laura sighed and let him go, trying to tell herself that it was just a phase. He was just mad that she'd gone to college out of state. She started her car and drove around town for a while, not quite ready to go home and face Derek again.
She found herself outside of the Argent house after a few hours of aimless cruising. Well, if she couldn't boss her brother around, at least she could take her anger out on his girlfriend.
Laura smirked at the fancy cars all lined up on the curb, just waiting for someone to do something to them. Sometimes werewolf claws came in handy.
VI.
Derek had decided that the best way to go about fixing the house was to work from the top down, since there wasn't a point in fixing the lower floors when the top was about to cave in anyway.
During the month of June, he'd completely redone the upstairs. The rotting walls were repaired, the dull wood floors were shined, and all of the broken bathroom fixtures were replaced. He even started paying his electricity bill after he fixed all the wiring.
It probably didn't look as nice as it would have if he'd paid someone to do it, but it gave him some satisfaction knowing he was the one who was rebuilding the house. And all in all, his repairs didn't look half bad. He'd always been good in tech ed classes during high school.
Unfortunately, he hadn't thought through the order of his repairs very well. After the second floor, he'd wanted to reshingle the roof. In the July heat.
It was rare that Derek made a plan, and when he did, he liked to make a point of sticking to it. So he sucked it up and began the arduous task of fixing the roof. He was pretty sure Bez enjoyed these repairs considerably more, since it meant he'd occasionally throw rotten shingles down for her to catch. When she'd bring them back, he'd toss her a reward from the bag of dog treats he carried up with him.
One day he watched a car snake down the driveway while he was up on the roof. Quickly, he jumped down – it would have been hard to explain how he'd gotten up there without a ladder – and tried to make it look like he'd been doing something on the ground level.
It wasn't until Scarlet had gotten out of her car and marched up to him that Derek realized not only was he drenched in sweat, but he was also very shirtless.
"Hi, um, you probably don't remember me, but-"
"Scarlet. Laura's friend from med school. Bringer of dogs who eat people out of their homes."
She smirked. "Hey, you've got your sister to blame for that one. She's also why I'm here. In the letter she left me, it said that I was supposed to check up on you every so often, and I wasn't going to, because I thought you were some kind of brooding asshole, but…oh God, did I really just say that out loud?"
It was Derek's turn to smirk. "Do shirtless guys always make you this nervous?"
"You know I like brooding assholes better than conceited ones," Scarlet shot back. "It's the heat. It doesn't get this hot in Wisconsin."
"Try shingling a roof."
"I thought the place looked different," Scarlet said, looking back at the house. "Wait, still no front door."
"Most of the work's been on the second floor so far. It needed it the most," Derek said defensively.
"Do you, um, need help with anything? I wouldn't be any good at shingling a roof, but…"
Derek thought about it for a second. He'd put off decorating the second floor, because honestly, Laura had made it obvious that he'd had terrible taste on the several occasions when she'd criticized his wardrobe or the way he'd decorated his bedroom when they were younger. And honestly, since he was doing this more or less for Laura, he wanted it to look nice.
Derek scratched his head. "Are you good at painting? Decorating, maybe? Like, if I gave you a credit card, would you be able to make the inside of the house look nice? Assuming you don't have anywhere else to be…"
"These fingers can do open heart surgery," Scarlet said, making jazz hands in front of Derek's face. "I think I can figure out how to work a paint brush." She shrugged. "It's the summer. Who cares if I take some time off from work?"
Derek reached into his pocket and handed her his credit card. Did it matter if he spent the last of the Hale estate on making the house look nice again? He didn't really have a plan beyond fixing the house up. "You might want to start by buying a bed, unless you want to share with me and Bez. There's a furniture store here in town. And Wal-Mart's got paint and stuff."
"You don't even know my name, and you trust me with your credit card?" Scarlet asked.
"I figure anyone my sister sends my way can't be too bad," Derek said honestly.
And just like that, they fell into a routine so easily it felt like they'd known each other for years. Scarlet spent a few days picking out paint samples and furniture. She also got them a tent to share, since it probably wouldn't be good to breathe in all the paint fumes once she got going.
Scarlet liked to wake up early, and Derek liked to sleep in till noon, so she'd take Bez out for a run in the morning and make a late breakfast for the two of them when he woke up. She'd also thrown out the few molding things left in the fridge and gotten real food. Derek couldn't remember the last time he'd ate so much. If he didn't start working out again, he was going to lose his six pack by the end of the summer.
He also had to start using a ladder to get on and off the roof. If Scarlet thought it was weird that there hadn't been one there before, she never said anything, though she did express several times that she thought he was crazy for going up there by himself.
While Derek worked on the roof, Scarlet took to the walls with such a ferocity that Derek wondered if she wasn't crazy herself. "You know they're not going to go anywhere," he said one night while she made supper for the two of them.
"I shattered the record for fastest triple bypass surgery at the hospital where I did my residency – shaved half an hour off the last guy's time," Scarlet said proudly. "Your sister told me I only have one speed: fast."
It was one of the few times either of them had mentioned Laura since Scarlet had agreed to help Derek fix the house. It seemed to put a bad vibe in the air, and they looked away from each other for a moment before one of them thought to change the subject.
They spent their nights together in the tent Scarlet had bought. Thankfully, Bez decided it was more fun to wander around the woods than share it with them. Scarlet had also bought sleeping bags, but the heat didn't go away at night, so they ended up being used as glorified pillows.
The first full moon of the month came, and Derek tried to slip away as secretively as possible to make sure his pack wasn't causing any trouble. He'd been neglecting them lately, but he trusted Scott to keep them in line.
When he came home that morning, Scarlet was sitting at the kitchen table waiting for him. "The upstairs is done now," she said quietly. "I really should go."
Derek felt his heart drop to his stomach. He'd gotten so used to having her around that it felt impossible to imagine finishing the house without her. "I …yeah, I guess," he said.
"Um, your sister gave me a specific date I'm supposed to come back here. The last weekend of August," Scarlet said. "I know that sounds crazy, but I'm learning that she's got a way of just knowing how things are supposed to play out."
A specific date? What had Laura planned before she died? "Okay," Derek said.
"And, um, there will be someone else with me."
"Someone else?"
"That's all your sister said I could tell you. Maybe you'll have the rest of the house done by the time we come back?"
"Yeah, probably."
"I marked some pages in the Ikea catalogue if you want ideas for how to decorate downstairs. And, um, I got you some new clothes. They're in the dresser of your new room. If they don't fit, receipts are in the top drawer." Derek must have been gawking at her, because she quickly added, "Urban Outfitters was having a sale. I couldn't help it." She laughed, which Derek took to mean she was kidding.
"Okay, so, I'll see you in August."
"Take care of yourself, Derek," she said with a smile.
As soon as she left, Derek went upstairs to see the changes she'd made. He went into the bedroom that had used to be his and found that true to her word, Scarlet had filled the wardrobe with clothes. She'd even gotten a few black shirts for him and a nice new leather jacket.
On the bed was a box with a note on top of it. Your sister told me about the fire. I found this in the attic – it must have survived. It looks like it's your stuff.
Derek opened it, realizing with horror it was full of all the souvenirs of Kate he'd stashed away after the first time they'd broken up. He'd thrown all of the stuff in a box and shoved it in the attic, hoping to forget all about it, but not quite willing to get rid of it.
Well, he sure was willing now. Sometimes werewolf claws came in handy.
VII.
Laura made the three hour drive from college to home in less than thirty minutes. If any officers were worried about the Camaro going 100 miles an hour down the highway, they must have realized that only someone who really desperately needed to be somewhere would be going that fast.
The keys were hardly out of the ignition by the time Laura was hopping out of the car and wrapping her brother in her arms. The police had given her the details on the phone – big fire, we suspect foul play, no survivors – and she'd been able to put the pieces together. If Derek hadn't, well, she wasn't going to be the one to tell him.
"It's going to be okay, Derek," she whispered as he shook against her. "It's going to be okay."
A few minutes later, one of the paramedics tapped her shoulder, letting her know that there had been one person who'd managed to get out, but they were badly burned. She had to decide if they should put them on life support or let them go.
She stepped away from her brother and asked if they'd identified the body. The medic said that they were nearly certain it was Peter Hale.
She couldn't help but laugh bitterly at how he'd been right about her one day becoming an alpha. The only thing was she sure was a damn terrible one if her pack had already been reduced to her and her younger brother.
It would have been better if she'd just let Peter go, but she couldn't bring herself to let her favorite uncle die. Quietly, she told the paramedic to put him on life support and gave him her contact information so the care center Peter was placed at could get in touch with her later.
Laura went back to her brother, who hadn't moved an inch since she'd left him. He was just staring at the last few bits of the flames, unblinking. "Look, Derek. We're going to get out of here. I'll enroll you in a high school close to my college. We'll get an apartment. It'll be okay. We'll have each other."
Derek just shook his head, the only sign that he'd actually heard a word she'd said. Patiently, she led him to her car, settling him in the passenger seat and buckling his seatbelt for him. She kissed his forehead. "It's not your fault, Derek."
It wasn't until they'd been on the road for a few hours that he finally spoke to her. "It is. It's all my fault."
So he'd figured out about Kate. Laura couldn't bring herself to be angry at Derek. She should have wrung the bitch's neck when she'd had the chance. She shouldn't have provoked the Argent family.
It broke her heart that in spite of all of that, she couldn't keep Derek from blaming himself.
VIII.
Derek devoted all of his attention to fixing up the rest of the house. His painting skills weren't half as good as Scarlet's, and as a result, the living room walls ended up with a lot of paintings to hide the spots where he'd messed up. Deciding that it was probably for the best, he hired a company to paint the outside of the house, though he fixed up the deck and stained it himself.
All in all, he finished the repairs, got the outside of the house painted, and had new windows and doors installed a few weeks before Scarlet was supposed to come back. He even paid some kid to come mow the lawn every week. Unless he decided to build a garage for the Camaro, there really wasn't anything left to do.
And after being focused on one thing for so long, Derek found that he had way too much free time. He took up Scarlet's habit of taking Bez for a run in the morning and thought about converting one of the bedrooms into a home gym, then decided against it. He'd already spent enough money on renovating the house.
Derek started spending time with his wolves again. Scott had done a good job of keeping them safe, but he'd let them get horribly out of shape. For his first training session with all of them, he let them gang up against him. Feeling generous, he even let them blindfold him. Unfortunately, he'd been able to kick all of their asses without breaking a sweat.
One day Derek even went to the library and looked up local colleges on the computer, though the numerous possibilities quickly overwhelmed him and he left feeling frustrated. He wasn't going to start planning his next move until he saw the last card Laura had up her sleeve.
The weekend finally came, and he waited anxiously for the sight of Scarlet's car coming down the road. To celebrate the occasion, he'd even worn a shirt that was a bluish shade of gray. Even Bez picked up on his excitement. She ran around the yard, occasionally dashing off into the woods in pursuit of something, always hopping out a few seconds later and barking to remind him that she was still there.
Finally, as the sun was just starting to set, Derek heard the car approaching.
He could have practically ran and hugged Scarlet when she got out of the car, her long hair blowing slightly in the wind. It'd gotten lighter since he'd last seen her. She gave him a weak smile and walked over to him. "The person Laura wanted you to meet is in the car. I just…wanted to remind you to keep an open mind. You're prickly with people you don't know very well, you know."
"I am not prickly," he said defensively.
She shrugged. "Just, you know. Don't act shocked. Don't get mad. And would it kill you to smile every so often?"
Derek could pick up on her tension. "Okay, okay."
Scarlet walked back to the car and opened the back door, holding out her hand. A tiny one grabbed it and slid out, revealing a girl equally as small.
Derek sucked in his breath sharply. This was why she'd asked him not to get shocked – because standing right in front of him was the exact image of his sister – albeit one that'd gone back in time.
Scarlet led the little girl over. Once they stopped, his sister's little twin clutched at Scarlet's leg, almost hiding behind her. Derek remembered what she'd said about smiling and tried to make himself look welcoming. He was pretty sure he missed the mark, though.
"Come on, honey. Introduce yourself," Scarlet said gently.
The little girl mumbled something to the ground. Scarlet tapped her on the shoulder and pointed her chin at Derek, giving her an encouraging smile. "Hi, Mister Derek," she said. She couldn't say her r's right, so his name sounded more like Dewek. "My name is Gabby Hale and I'm four." She held up four tiny little fingers to prove her point.
Derek stared at her, then back at Scarlet, then back to her, not sure what he was supposed to say.
"Do you have any toys in your house? It was a really long car ride," she said, fixing her big pale eyes on him and batting her long eyelashes.
Derek bit his lip, trying to think of what the hell he was supposed to do. "Well, Gabby, I don't, but I know this magic place where they have all the toys you can think of," he said. Okay, he'd been the baby of his family. He did not know how to act around little kids.
"You mean Wal-Mart?" she asked, her eyes lighting up.
"Yeah, that's right," Derek said, nodding encouragingly.
"Can we go to Old Macdonald's too?"
Derek assumed she meant McDonald's. "Sure. Just get in the car and we'll meet you there in a second."
Gabby smiled brightly and skipped back to the car, waiting patiently for someone to open the door for her.
Derek stepped closer to Scarlet. "Is she who I think she is?" he demanded in a hushed whisper.
"If you think she's your niece who's inherited the werewolf gene, then yeah, she's exactly who you think she is," Scarlet said.
"Wait, you know about that?"
"I was Laura's roommate all through college and med school. There are some things you eventually catch on to," Scarlet said with a wave of her hand. "Look, the point is, she told me if anything ever happened to her, I would have to take care of Gabby, but I was probably going to need your help with the whole werewolf thing."
"Like, raising her?"
"Yeah."
Derek stared at her blankly. "I know nothing about four year old girls."
"And I know nothing about werewolves, so it's a damn good thing we have each other," Scarlet said flashing Derek a saccharine smile. "Now come on, you're about to get a crash course in dealing with people whose interests include Barbies, Rapunzel, and slinkies."
She grabbed Derek's hand and forcefully dragged him to the car, gesturing for him to get in the passenger side. Once she'd buckled up Gabby in her seat and started the car, Gabby perked up in the back seat.
"Are you guys married?"
Even though it was adorable how she said mawwied, Derek still felt like jumping out of the car and making a run for it.
It was only then that he realized what today was: the anniversary of the fire. Miraculously, he hadn't thought if it once throughout the entire day, and with a little kid in the back seat who was focused on getting toys and cheap fast food, he couldn't bring himself to feel like moping.
Of course Laura would have had this all planned out.
She always had a plan.
IX
Over the last four years, Laura had slowly watched any semblance of control slip from her life. She'd gotten pregnant, lied to the father, bombed her MCAT, had her daughter, graduated college a semester early, and shown up to her brother's graduation without giving him any hint how much things had changed. It killed her to lie to him, but it was easier than admitting how much she'd screwed up.
She and Derek had drifted apart over the last few years as much as an alpha and beta possibly could. When she'd announced she was transferring to a college in the Midwest, he'd shrugged and told her he was staying where he was. He'd been 17 at the time – she figured he could take care of himself.
The thing that Derek didn't realize was that alphas had a very one-sided connection to members of their pack. Even if they didn't want to, they had this acute sense of where the other members of their pack were, how they were doing, and if they needed help. Though she hadn't seen her brother more than once or twice in the last few years, it hadn't felt like she'd left him.
It was her mistake in assuming he felt the same way.
The second they were out of the crowded gymnasium, he let her have it. "Look, you can quit trying to play the concerned parent. I'm old enough to take care of myself now, and it's obvious the only reason you're here is because you feel like it's necessary, since you've hardly called me in the last year."
"Derek, a lot's been going on."
"So much that you couldn't make time for your own brother?"
Laura bit her lip. So much had been going on. She could hardly stand to think of how much she'd messed up her own life. Her conversations with Derek were always turned back to her, since her brother didn't like sharing much about his life, and she wasn't ready to admit to him everything that had happened.
"Did you apply to colleges? What are you going to do in the fall?" Laura asked, utilizing the same tactic that Derek always used against her – a quick change of subject.
"It doesn't matter. Just leave me alone."
She could have commanded him to come back, and he would have had to obey his alpha. She could have ordered him to get his ass in gear and figure out what he was going to do with his life. She could have demanded that he quit acting like a dick and go back to worshipping her like he always had before Kate came in the picture.
But she didn't. She just let him go.
He'd always pushed people away, but he'd never done it to her. She'd always told herself it was because she was the one person he could trust, the one person who'd never let him down.
And now what was she? The shining example of what not to do.
Four years later, something was compelling Laura to go back to Beacon Hills. The wolf side of her just felt like she was needed – though she had no idea who there could be in need of assistance.
If for no other reason, she'd at least visit the real estate office in town and sell the property where their old house sat. At least that way she'd be able to pay off her student loans. Doctors who bombed their MCAT's didn't get many scholarships, even if they were orphans.
For some reason, she had a feeling she wasn't going to be coming back to Wisconsin any time soon.
The night she left she tucked her daughter in, and as a special treat, she got one of the photo albums she'd made with what had survived the fire and went through it with Gabby.
"Remember him?" she asked, pointing to a picture from Derek's graduation. She wasn't even sure how she'd gotten it.
"That's Mister Derek," Gabby said brightly.
"Gabby, why do you always call him Mister Derek?"
Gabby thought about it for a second, staring intently at the picture. "Because he always looks so…sewious. He just looks like a Mister, Mama."
Laura laughed in spite of herself and kissed her daughter's forehead. "You might get to meet him soon, Gabby. Until then, make sure you listen to Scarlet and do what she tells you to do." The worst part of leaving was knowing who she was leaving behind. "I love you."
"Love you too, Mama."
She'd written her letter to Scarlet ahead of time, because if she'd waited till now, she wasn't sure she would have been able to go through with it. She looked over it one last time before tucking it in her roommate's dresser, where she'd be sure to find it in the morning.
Then, before she could talk herself out of it, she left.
X.
Laura had wrote in her will that if anything were to happen to her, Derek Hale and Scarlet Petersen were to share custody of her daughter. From there, it was just a matter of contacting a lawyer and signing a few papers to make their legal guardianship, well, legal.
Derek moved through the first few weeks on autopilot. He signed Gabby up for preschool, which would meet twice a week for half a day once fall got into full swing. Scarlet never expressed any desire to go back home, and a few days after she came with Gabby, all the things from her apartment were delivered by FedEx.
Derek realized he'd never noticed how she'd painted the smallest room upstairs a pale pink and put up a butterfly border or stocked the bookshelf with fairy tales. Gabby loved her new room – she loved her new house in general.
One night when she and Derek were spread out on the living room floor playing with her Barbies, she offered her first critique of her new surroundings. "Why is there a picture of an ugly banana on the wall?" she asked, waving a little hand at the picture of a fruit bowl.
"Because the paint job underneath is even uglier," Derek confessed.
Scarlet, who'd been reading the paper on the couch, smirked. "Want to get a family portrait taken, Gabby? We can get you a new dress and everything."
Derek was fairly certain she'd only brought up the idea as an excuse to put him in a shirt that wasn't black or gray. However, the experience hadn't been half as bad as he'd anticipated; when the photographer at Sears asked them if they were married, Scarlet had responded before he could even open his mouth. "Actually, this is his niece, my deceased best friend's kid. It's a complicated story, and they're actually making a movie about it. Check out Lifetime this Friday night."
During the photo shoot, whenever Scarlet snapped at him to smile, all he had to think about was the look on the photographer's face.
Conveniently, a job opened up for a cardiac surgeon at Beacon Hills Memorial Hospital. A few days later, info from one of the local community colleges that Derek had checked out came in the mail. "Going back to school?" Scarlet asked.
"I wouldn't exactly call it going back. I never did the whole college thing," Derek admitted.
"Really? What did you do after high school?" Scarlet asked.
Derek was surprised Laura had never told her, especially since he'd gotten a long-winded phone call from him when she'd found out. "I joined the Marine Corps," he admitted. "I had just finished my second tour and gotten home when a few weeks later…" He'd once been hard on Scarlet for not being able to talk about Laura's death, and now he was the same way.
"Well, ever think about doing something like that? I don't know, law enforcement?" Scarlet suggested.
It was as good a plan as any. He signed up for classes the next day, surprised to find out that he qualified for an accelerated program – he'd have all his schooling done in just six months.
They never talked about Laura. It was the elephant in the room, especially when Gabby was there. She never said anything about her mom, and Derek wasn't exactly sure how to approach the subject. He also wasn't sure how much to say about the whole werewolf thing.
"You know the full moon is tomorrow," Scarlet mentioned one night as the two of them made supper while Gabby played outside with Bez. "Are you going to say something to her?"
"Like what?" Derek asked, chopping up the vegetables on the cutting board with a bit more force than necessary. When Scarlet didn't answer, he continued on. "How did you handle it when you were taking care of her?"
"Laura gave me a list of werewolves I could ask for help," Scarlet explained. "Gabby just spent the night with whoever was available. They never tried to explain anything to her. Most of them were bitten…and I guess it's different when you're born a wolf?" She phrased the last part as a question, looking at Derek for an explanation.
"You are so responsible for the sex talk," Derek muttered under his breath, not sure if Scarlet heard him or not. All through dinner, she kept giving him pointed looks, but he had no idea what he was supposed to say.
The truth was that even though Gabby was his niece, he still had no idea how to act around her.
When the next night came around, Derek didn't think anything of it until he heard the soft padding of footsteps outside his door. He would have assumed it was Bez going downstairs for a late night snack, except Bez still shared his bed and was right there next to him snoring.
He slipped out of bed and followed the footsteps, watching a little wolf cub slip outside through the dog door. Something that was unique to born werewolves was that in addition to their half-form, they also could become wolves on the full moon, though as they got older, they rarely chose to do so. The complete wolf form made them vulnerable.
Derek opened the door quietly and changed into his own wolf form, stealthily trailing the little cub who was so eager to explore the forest. He took a deep breath, satisfied that there were no humans in the woods. If there were, he'd make sure to take them out before they could even catch a glimpse of his niece.
Eventually, Gabby realized she was being followed and turned to look at him. She cocked her head sideways and tilted an ear. The question was obvious. Mama?
Derek slowly approached her, nuzzling her neck with his wolf snout. He hadn't completely transformed since he and Laura were kids, but it felt natural out in the woods with Gabby. No, it's Derek.
He'd also forgotten the intimate way that werewolves communicated, almost like they could hear each other's thoughts – which in a pack that was made up of family members, was essentially what happened.
Gabby flopped down on her side, defeated. I miss Mama.
Derek laid down on the ground next to her. He wrapped a paw around her chest and pulled her close, just like Laura used to do for him when he was younger. I miss her too, he admitted.
How come you never came and visited her? She missed you. Sometimes she'd just look at her pictures of you and cry.
Derek wasn't sure how to put it in terms that a little girl would understand. We both made mistakes, and we didn't know how to deal with them.
It's not that hard. All you have to do is say you're sorry.
Derek thought for a long time before finally responding to her. Sometimes the reasons we make mistakes are worse than the mistakes themselves.
Gabby let out a little puff of air and Derek realized she'd fallen asleep. He shut his eyes as well and tried to do the same. He couldn't fix what had happened in the past, but at least he could be there for her when she woke up.
Laura had once told Derek shortly after the fire that at the end of the day, you either focused on what was holding you together or ripping you apart.
Of course Laura would leave him with not one but two people to hold him together when she couldn't.
She always had a plan.
XI.
Scarlet,
This isn't fair to you. You've done more for me than I can ever repay you for. You picked up my rent so many times during college. You helped me get into med school when I was convinced I was going to be stuck working at McDonald's for the rest of my life. Most importantly, you helped me raise Gabby. You've been the one constant thing in my life while everything else has spun out of control. That's why I feel so terrible asking this one last thing of you, but I don't know who else I can trust with two of the most important people in my life.
I'm going back to Beacon Hills tonight, and I just have this feeling that I won't be coming back. Maybe I'm wrong and this is all just me blowing things out proportion, but I have this instinct. Yes, it's one of those wolf ones.
Theoretically, if I don't come back, I need you first and foremost to take care of Gabby. Please be the mom she won't get to have. Don't try to lie to her about what's happened to me. She's a brave kid – or maybe I'm just telling myself that so I feel less terrible. Be honest with her, and take care of her.
I'm afraid that's the easy part.
Remember my younger brother? I know I haven't talked to him in years, but I still feel like he's my responsibility. I don't even know what he's doing with his life right now, but if he's anything like I remember, he's throwing himself into the moment so he doesn't have to think about what comes next.
We've always been kind of alike in that way. The only difference is that at least he's open about it. I try to hide behind this curtain of responsibility and duty and force myself to keep moving forward. Once I had Gabby, I had to figure out what I was going to do. Derek hasn't had something like that happen to him yet.
If something happens to me, he'll come back to Beacon Hills, and I'm pretty sure he'll stay at least for a little while. I'm not saying it has to be right away, but can you check up on him from time to time? Make sure he's doing okay.
Oh, and I'd really like it if you gave Bez to him. I think she'll be good for him.
Here's the hard part, because I'm going to ask you to try and decide what's best for Gabby. Derek's always been difficult to judge – I think in his heart, he's always had good intentions, but he puts all these walls up to keep people out. He doesn't know how to trust anyone. I think that's mostly my fault.
I want him to be in Gabby's life, but I don't want her to get hurt by him. It's selfish of me to keep them from each other, but sometimes it's the people we love the most that are the easiest to hurt. When you're checking up on Derek, I want you to see if you can decide if he and Gabby will be good for each other.
If not, I attached another sheet that has contact information for some friends who are like me. You know, werewolves. You'll need help with Gabby when she gets older.
But if you do decide that they'll be good for each other, I want you to wait until the last weekend of August to introduce them to each other. I know it's a long ways off, but that's just the way it has to be.
And if you don't think he can handle Gabby, please remember to at least give him Bez. He needs some kind of responsibility in his life.
I'm rambling now because I don't want this to end, but do you want to know something funny? My parents let me name Derek. I wanted to name him Laura, but my uncle suggested I play off of my middle name – Erika. Erik was too similar, so we came up with Derek. My parents gave him the middle name Gabriel, because that was the name they'd wanted. When I found out I was pregnant, I immediately knew that I wanted my daughter to be named Gabriella. When I was little, I wanted Derek to know that I would share everything with him, even my name. Now I want him to do the same for my daughter.
I really am so selfish.
I love you, Scarlet. Please don't hate me too much for all of this. I really do hope I'll be home in a few days so you can kick my ass for worrying you so much.
Laura
[A/N] So this was a Christmas gift for a good friend. There are still some things about it that bother me, but it's as good as it'll ever be. If I ever feel up to writing it, there's a second portion that focuses more on Scarlet and Gabby, specifically their relationships with Derek. Reviews are love and Merry Christmas. ^_^